LA Hold 'Em
by TornadoMoose
Summary: Before Afghanistan, Kensi and Deeks take a gamble with their partnership and their friendship. It was many months of bluffs, bets and upping the stakes before their gamble paid off. (Seasons 5 & 6). Mostly canon compliant (at least not explicitly AU).
1. Shuffling the Deck

**Updates for re-readers: A couple of chapters ended up published out of order. They've now been moved to their correct chronological location. If you happen to peruse reviews, chapters 2 & 3 were published as 14 & 15\. Additionally, several chapters have received minor error/grammatical corrections. **

**A/N: Starting with the cliffhanger at the end of 5x09 ("Recovery") before Kensi heads to Afghanistan, my intention is to fill in some gaps going all the way on through the events of 6x11 ("Humbug") when they officially start dating.**

 **Much of what we see transpire between them suggests that while they hadn't defined their relationship, in my opinion they're still probably knockin' boots in their spare time. I have no proof to offer… just my own wishful thinking and a couple of suggestive lines from the show's script. Consider this a later-seasons connected collection of 'partners with privileges' that will hopefully offer some support for my theory. If nothing else, it should be fun to read.**

 **Disclaimer: If I actually owned any of these characters or the show(s) they're in, I wouldn't need to post this disclaimer. Not that I technically need to post this disclaimer. I just like writing snarky 'legal' disclaimers.**

 **Rating: M…**

 **… Seriously… like— all of the chapters are rated "M." It's literally all I write. Why would I write anything else?**

* * *

 **(Chapter 1: Shuffling the Deck)**

 **A/N: So let's start off with my take on what happened after they left the restaurant in 5x09 ("Recovery"). This plot line has been written so well by so many people, but it can't hurt to contribute another log to the fire.**

* * *

"…And we've been over this, about how you _never_ say what you mean. And if this is the way it's gonna be, then I don't know how we're ever—"

"I don't want to be with you here right now," Deeks blurted so suddenly and bluntly that he surprised himself, as well as Kensi.

"What?" she asked, perplexed and on the verge of feeling hurt.

Deeks held her steady gaze, struggling to maintain composure as he prepared to tell her, "I want to be at my place right now… with you."

Kensi stared at him open mouthed, considering what he had just said. Deeks waited patiently, and cocked his head slightly in the tiniest motion towards the door. Still, Kensi said nothing. She took a breath, then slowly, deliberately, she got up from the fancy restaurant chair and headed towards the door.

Deeks breathed deep and paused before following her. Did he blow it? Was she pissed? It had been hard to make out her expression, but he was fairly sure she wasn't angry with him. When she looked back at him from the entryway of the building to be sure he was following, he thought he saw a faint smile.

They walked in silence through the parking lot to where their cars were parked. Deeks climbed in his car, then looked at her with concern when he saw her continuing on to hers.

She glanced back at him and confirmed, "Your place?"

Deeks smiled and nodded while he cleared his throat enough to manage, "Yeah. See you there?"

He was glad she was driving ahead of him as he was pretty sure he'd have crashed by now if he constantly had to look in his review mirror to make sure she was still there.

After the longest 12 minute drive he'd ever experienced, they finally made it back to his building. He parked his car in his garage stall, unlocked his front door and waited expectantly in his doorway for her to appear from around the corner up the road where she parked. She wouldn't meet his gaze as she walked up the garden path to where he stood.

When Kensi had joined him inside and closed the door behind them, locking the rest of the world out for the night, Deeks just stood there unsure of what to do. She'd been to his place hundreds of times before, but they both knew this was different. He had made the first move of getting her to come over, but he wanted her to decide the direction they would go from here.

Still she remained silent, but held his gaze as she moved closer to him. The low light from the hall way accentuated the difference in her eyes. His own eyes pierced intensely into hers, searching for any indication of what was to come next. He didn't have to wait much longer.

Gently, she put her hands on his chest, running them slowly up to his shoulders and behind his neck. She pulled him in and pressed into his waiting lips, tentatively at first, then more deliberately and with more purpose.

Reluctantly, Deeks broke the kiss. "We should talk about this."

"Or not," she responded by covering his mouth with hers again.

"We _really_ should talk about this," he tried again between her demanding kisses.

"I _really_ don't want to talk about this," she said with finality as she began to push him slowly in the direction of his bedroom.

Deeks knew he was right; knew that she was the one who had insisted they needed to communicate better. But now that the time had come, it seemed she would rather not. Perhaps she was too afraid that one or both of them would come up with a reason to not do this. He couldn't help but agree that it was an unacceptable risk.

Never allowing their mouths to break contact, even for their already shortening breaths, they bumped into walls and door frames on their clumsy journey to Deeks' bedroom. They had both managed to lose their shoes along the way before they finally crashed down on the soft mattress.

Kensi pulled herself up the bed and Deeks shifted above her, settling down so his forehead pressed against hers. Kisses that had been desperate and passionate only moments before were now languid and sweet, as a silence settled around them broken only by their occasional soft moans.

Kensi pulled away to look at him. Deeks could see the concern in her soft gaze, even as the desire he also saw in her eyes made it nearly impossible to not try and kiss her worries away.

"What's wrong?" he asked her softly.

She looked at him carefully. The light from the hallway again illuminating her eyes. "You know if we do this, this changes everything."

"So what do you want to do?" he asked cautiously.

"I don't want to have to choose."

"Then don't. Then don't choose. We don't—" he tried to convince her, desperation edging in his voice.

"You know that's not how it works." she interrupted. "What do you think's going to happen?"

"I don't know." he said shaking his head. "I don't care."

She shook her head in response and fought back a tear as she gripped his shirt tighter. He waited anxiously for her to answer. No one had ever made him feel like this and he hated it as much as he loved it.

"What are you doing to me, Deeks?" she asked, her voice cracking under the strain of several emotions.

"I'm falling in love with you," his soft words were spoken against her lips as her hands came up to cup his face.

Again their caresses grew more voracious as Kensi worked to push his sweatshirt off his shoulders. His own hands were busy with the buttons on her grey shirt, and in quick order they were both left in nothing but their undergarments.

Kensi arched into his touch below him, pinned by his hard muscles yet completely in control. Deeks was able to remove her bra with little resistance. Her breasts finally bare to him for the first time, he completely froze and gawked at them. She smiled at his bewitched expression and ran her hands up the smooth plane of his back in an attempt to break the spell. He dropped a kiss to her lips and gently slid his hand over the swell of her breasts; first the left, then the right, caressing her nipples lightly as he went.

Tender kneads turned into firm squeezes as he peppered kisses down her throat, across her collar bone and finally on each of her soft mounds. She moaned louder when he ran his tongue around each bud, sucking lavishly before releasing her with a satisfied hum.

She whimpered as his mouth abandoned her breasts and continued down her body. Deeks took his time learning each curve of her torso, her tight stomach, and her waist with his lips. But she was getting impatient, so as his hands reached the waistband of her panties, she helped him remove them a little quicker.

"Flowers? How girly," he commented, smiling as he tossed them aside and settled his chest between her legs.

"Says the man with smiley faces on his boxers," she pointed out to him in a breathy voice.

"What can I say?" he asked as he lifted each of her legs above his shoulders. "I'm happy in my pants."

Rather than retort at his lame (but accurate) joke, Kensi let out a gasp as his scruff tickled her inner thighs. Surprising him, she tugged at his jaw, then his shoulders to bring his mouth back up to hers.

"Please," she asked on the verge of begging. Her eyes as dark as he'd ever seen them. "Now."

Deeks didn't need to be told what she was asking for. Her hands had been pushing at his boxers and working to free his substantial erection. With no more preamble and one last look in her eyes he began to push into her. Slowly at first, careful to let her adjust. With each purposeful stroke, he pushed a little deeper, earning a gratifying moan from her kiss swollen lips.

He kept the pace slow. Drawing out almost entirely before burying himself again and again. Each time allowing both of them to feel each bump and ridge, every bit of friction where they were now intimately connected. Kensi tried unsuccessfully to urge him to increase his pace, instead settling for drawing him in more forcefully with her long legs wrapped tightly around his waist.

Kensi was quickly losing control. Her breathing was erratic and she let out a moan or a whimper with each of his movements. Her arms curled around his shoulders, pressing his chest into hers. She latched onto his mouth, taking his lower lip in between hers and released it only to cry out his name as she careened towards an intense climax.

"Oh God, Kens," Deeks growled as he too lost his composure, finally breaking down and slamming into her with speed. He could feel his balls tighten and knew he had only seconds.

A garbled noise and what sounded like his name is all Kensi could manage as she finally succumbed to the pleasure he had given her. Still moving slowly inside her, Deeks came down from his high with her. Delighting in her tight convulsions he could still feel, he whispered her name reverently in her ear.

She turned in his arms as he rolled onto his back, and they pulled the covers up. The sheets clung to their sweaty bodies, but neither could find the energy to care.

They didn't speak. But Kensi pressed an affectionate kiss to his lips and held his gaze warmly for a moment before tucking her head into his neck and she gradually allowed her breathing to slow. Deeks smiled at the revelation that Kensi like to cuddle, and pulled her tighter to him. He wanted to say so many things to her, but feared that he might ruin this otherwise perfect moment. So instead he let her drift to sleep contentedly.

As he held her in his arms, gazing at her sleeping form, Deeks knew that Kensi had been right: this had changed everything. If he had harbored any doubt before, now he knew: there is nothing he wouldn't do to keep her safe from harm. He took solace with the fact that she was here with him now. But with a growing sense of trepidation about what tomorrow might bring, Deeks fell into an uneasy sleep.

* * *

Eighteen hours later, all of Deeks' hard earned cautious optimism had been immediately rewarded with a swift kick to the groin from the reality that was their jobs.

 _"Your partner has been reassigned… A classified mission… Indefinitely."_ Hetty's words played on a loop in his head as he sat at an intersection on his way home, completely oblivious to the green light in front of him or the impatient honking behind him.

He eventually continued moving and even managed to swing by the store on his way home to pick up some essentials: beer, Kensi's favorite brew; and Haagen-Dazs, her favorite ice cream. Yes, he was hurting. And he knew this was going to be a long ' _indefinite'_ period of time.

As he sat on his couch not really watching an episode of _America's Next Top Model_. Idly wondering how much weight he might gain on this new diet, it occurred to him again that this might all be his fault. They hadn't been careful enough. The team had immediately picked up on the change in tension between them. Worst of all, he had let it affect him in the field. Angry as he was at Hetty for what he was convinced was a punishment, or at least a preventative attempt at keeping the two partners separated, he only blamed himself and his own lack of self-command.

Deeks had never thought he'd be affected this way. Even on the few occasions he'd gotten too close to a suspect, a source, or even a partner in the past, he had still managed to mostly keep his emotions in control. But as with everything, Kensi was different.

He had been so sure that they could make this work; that they could figure out how to make it work; that he was already learning how to better keep himself in check. He thought he had finally been dealt a winning hand. But Hetty had gone and reshuffled the deck.


	2. Buy In

**(Chapter 2: Buy In)**

 **A/N:** **I had originally wanted to do this (and the next) chapter from the start. But I was both so impatient to get on with the story arc, and not yet confident enough in my ability to write 'solo' scenes (still not), that I cut it from the initial outline. Regretting that decision, I've gone back and attempted to write a pair of lonely Densi fantasies.**

 **This first one is set after 5x11 ("Merry Evasion").**

 **Also note, if you're the sort that reads reviews: be aware that the reviews for ch. 2 & 3 might be found under 13 & 14... and chapters 4-12 all shifted back 2... Maybe... I haven't figured out how the site handles rearranging chapters (which I eventually figured out how to do). Oh well.**

 **Rating: Who knew a story with just one character could still be rated M? (I did).**

* * *

She had only been gone a few weeks.

A younger Deeks might have told himself to go out, and find someone who was just as lonely as he was during the holidays. But that really wasn't his scene anymore. It had been a while, months for sure— Damn, had it really been over a year?— since he'd picked up a woman from a bar… or even gone on a real date as himself, with someone who wasn't the focus of an undercover operation.

To be fair, he'd been busy. It seemed like this past year had been more intense than any he'd experienced before. Oh right, that's because it had been. Chasing around stolen nukes had really raised the bar. And something had changed in him when he was taken and tortured. On one hand, he had a new appreciation for the fragility of life and the need to live in the moment. On the other, fleeting experiences like one time encounters simply didn't mean anything to him anymore. Maybe he was finally growing up. Or maybe he was undeniably falling in love with his partner. Probably both.

His partner. Kensi… His jaw stiffened at the frustration he still felt about her having been reassigned. Hetty hadn't said so in words, but he couldn't shake the feeling that she knew that they had slept together, and sent her away on that classified mission quicker than was entirely necessary as a means of keeping them apart. Giving them a way to communicate did little to lessen that blow.

It was just after midnight on Christmas eve. Or really, early Christmas morning. The satellite phone Hetty had given him sat on the coffee table in front of him, and he resisted the urge to call her again. It was daylight in the middle east, not that he knew for sure exactly where she was, and she was likely working.

He had his laptop open and was investigating how to set up a little pet shop web page so they could communicate discreetly. Kensi had suggested it. Some spook stationed there with her told her about that technique, and after their hour long conversation they determined that Deeks should be the one to set it up. What little he already knew about HTML and web design made him think he could do it. But as soon as he read about web servers, security, scripts and user authentication, he knew he'd need to enlist the nerd herd to help him out with this project.

He closed those tabs and opened up a new private browser. He felt so tense and just wanted to find a release. But the pictures and ads that greeted him on the home page of the porn site he had pulled up did little to arouse him. They all looked so angry and fake, and no where near as beautiful and sexy as the real goddess of a woman who's image dominated his thoughts. With no inclination of forcing the matter, he decided to go to bed. Shutting down his computer, Deeks headed off to shower in a foul mood.

Deeks turned the nozzle half way down the cold side to try and calm himself down, and flinched when the water cascading over his body turned frigid. His breathing was short and he could feel his muscles tense even further, but the icy flow did nothing to cool his boiling blood; nothing to wash away the conflicting feelings of simultaneous angst and emotional numbness.

Finally, he relented and turned the water back to a hotter temperature until the bathroom started to fill with steam. As his body warmed, his skin tingled. He no longer tried to suppress the images of his partner that were dancing through his thoughts. And as soon as he allowed himself to focus on one, the floodgates opened.

With his eyes closed beneath the hot spray, he saw Kensi's smile; from her wide grin to her brightly shining, mismatched eyes. Her goofy, genuine laugh rang through his head, and it brought a slight smile to his face. Flashes from the jokes they'd shared, the close calls they'd survived, and the tender moments that had passed between them all blazed through his mind. It wasn't long before a specific memory dominated his thoughts though, and it made his heart flutter as much as it ached.

He tried to distract himself again by washing off. But once the scent of his shampoo and soap had filled the bathroom, he was reminded of that day a few weeks ago when just once, Kensi had shown up to the Mission smelling extra fresh, despite wearing yesterday's clothes. She had smelled of his soap, having showered at his place once he had left a little early for work. And it had added to his numerous distractions throughout that terrible day. Was there nothing that wouldn't draw his thoughts to his absent partner? Apparently not.

His skin was warm again, and with visions of their one perfect night together clouding his mind, Deeks began to harden. Sighing, he gave in and let one of his hands drift downward to take his dick between his thumb and forefingers. He tried to imagine that they were _her_ slender fingers tugging on him, sliding the soft skin back and forth. But she had never touched him like this. Their time together had been too frenzied— too hurried to have really explored each other's bodies. He regretted that now, but he had hoped at the time that they'd have more opportunities to take it slow.

He thought about her tongue and her lips; how they felt against his, how she tasted, how heavenly it was to finally kiss her. He thought about her putting those lips on his body. He wondered if she would have blown him if given the chance. He stiffened further at the thought.

His mind tried to conjure up the fantasy of her mouth wrapped around his cock. Of her eyes looking back up at him as her head bobbed up and down. Would she have teased him? Probably. Would she have played with his balls? God, he hoped so.

Automatically, he groped himself at the thought. He was fully hard now, past the point of no return. His skin stretched around the engorged tissue within, and he focused his efforts on his sensitive tip.

He lamented over the fact that she had impatiently stopped him from eating her out. He had been so ready to. He wondered how she tasted. He had gotten a good look at her pussy before she pulled him back up. Well groomed, save for a patch of soft curls just above her slit. Her parted folds had been glistening, and her clit had peeked through in excitement. It was an image he had labored to keep burned in his memory. As he worked his straining cock more vigorously with his hand, he tried to envision it clearly on the back of his eyelids.

But then he remembered her face. The way her eyes had fluttered and how she had bitten her lower lip as he pushed into her for the first time. He let a soft groan escape out loud when he recalled how she had moaned.

Remembering the way she clung to him, how she felt like liquid fire around him, and how completely out of control he had felt as he drove into her, he frantically tugged on the head of his dick a few times more. He came with a somewhat frustrated sigh, and braced himself against the tiles as he tried his hardest to enjoy those few seconds of euphoria before his depressed demeanor set back in.

Deeks finished washing up and shut off the shower. Finally, his body— and his mind, were temporarily relaxed. Barely bothering to towel off, he pulled on a pair of possibly clean boxers and stumbled into his bed.

* * *

 **A/N: "Depressing" and "Sexy" are not two adjectives I would normally use to describe the same thing. But in this case, they're what I would tag this chapter as.**

 **Kensi's version is coming up next. ;)**


	3. Poker Face

**(Chapter 3: Poker Face)**

 **A/N: Please note again that this is chronologically chapter 3; the second of the two chapters I decided to go back and write in. This one is lined up roughly with the end of 5x12 ("Allegiance").**

 **Rating: M. No snarky comment. Just M.**

* * *

 _Lock it down, Blye!_ She'd caught herself looking again at the picture Deeks had sent of himself. Kensi knew she should not be this flustered and worked up about someone on the other side of the planet. She needed to focus on the here and now. She was in a war zone, for God's sake! Granted, at the moment she was secure in the relative safety of the Marine forward operating base. But every now and then, the insurgents launched a Soviet era mortar shell their way. And the thin metal walls of the shipping container-turned operations center would do little to protect her from a direct hit.

In the long couple of months she had been in country, they had certainly kept her busy: the hunt for the 'white ghost,' the investigation into the NCIS field team that already seemed predisposed to distrust her, and occasionally being called up to provide overwatch cover for military operations in the region. Apparently snipers were in high demand and low supply at the moment.

The investigation of the last couple of days had actually been a welcome change of pace. Looking into anonymous money from the US that potentially financed a local terrorist group fronting as a medical clinic had almost been like a regular case from back home. More so because she actually got to work with her team, albeit from a very long distance.

It had been good to see the crew from OSP on that video call earlier in the day. She'd really missed their faces. Especially the one she hadn't seen. Deeks had been away with a witness at the end of the day when the rest of the team had appeared on screen to wrap up the case. She hadn't even realized how excited she was to see him for thirty seconds until she caught herself fluffing her hair and wishing she didn't look like she hadn't showered in days.

It was foolish, really. She talked with him on the phone fairly often, and they chatted online on days they couldn't speak. But there was something about the idea of actually seeing him; hearing his voice and seeing his lips move. The way he'd smile at her. How he probably would have ruffled his hair. Maybe he would have even laughed. She longed to hear his laugh. Oh well, she'd just have to wait until she could hear it in person.

She needed to at least appear as if she was keeping it together. Though truth be told, being in Afghanistan— away from her team in general and her partner in specific, was starting to get to her. She was pretty sure Granger could see right through her. With any luck though, he didn't know exactly what was troubling her.

She curled up tighter in the thick blankets she was wrapped up in. Kensi still had a rack all to herself: with a bunk to sleep in, and another for her rifle. Her nightly routine now always included flipping through pictures from home. At first it was a variety of photos: Monty, nights out with Nell, hanging with the guys, and the occasional pic of her family or a nice wilderness landscape. But she could no longer deny that the vast majority of the images she viewed more recently were of her partner's face.

Not for the first time, she found herself thinking about their one night together with regret. Mostly she lamented that they'd only had a single night to be with each other. If ever she regretted having slept with him, it was only because now she knew what she was missing and it made her feel the sting of their separation that much more acutely.

Kensi had never considered herself a woman who _needed_ to be touched. Which was a good thing really, given how seldom her job really allowed her the opportunity to date (even if she didn't despise the process). Or how unheard of it was for her to actually establish a satisfactory physical relationship. And how disappointed she typically was with her handful of infrequent one night stands.

And yet, here she was. Several weeks removed from the last time she'd felt a sweet release, and several thousand miles from the man who'd brought her to it. Admittedly, he had been good. Fantastic, really. But that may have also been because of the tension and heat between them. She was very anxious to put this theory to the test, but it would have to wait.

In the mean time, what did she need him for? She needed relief now, dammit! And she was more than capable of getting things done herself. She only wished her fingers weren't so cold. With one last look at a pic she had snapped of Deeks shirtless on the beach with his surfboard, she closed her phone and set it down on the ledge with her pistol.

With the last of the lights in the small room extinguished and her vision dark, Kensi tried to clear her mind as well. She let one of her hands drift down her torso, lightly dragging her finger tips against the cloth of her shirt. Even through the thick layers, she managed to stir a shiver down her spine.

She toyed briefly with the drawstring of her sweat pants, then slipped her hand beneath the sweater and base layer shirt she had been sleeping in. She traced her hand in small circles back up over her belly, ghosting her nails along her skin. When her hand reached the valley between her breasts, she pushed it across her chest until she had completely cupped one of the soft mounds in her palm. She massaged the smooth skin even after her nipple perked up, then moved on to the other breast.

Kensi's free hand had been drawing patterns on the flat of her stomach, she then sighed deeply and slipped it down beneath the elastic of her sweatpants. She felt the textured fabric of her camping underwear, and briefly rubbed at the flesh between her legs before sneaking her hand below that waistband as well.

Back and forth she massaged with two of her fingers, until they delved between her folds. She jerked slightly when the pad of one made contact with her clit. But after just a few moments of increased pressure, the sensation was gone. She tried to clear her racing mind, but no matter what she thought about, her subconscious kept conjuring up worse case scenarios to run down mentally.

Kensi then decided to do something in desperation she usually tried hard not to do: imagine the strong hands of her partner touching her. In an instant, her heart fluttered and a jolt ran straight from her gut to her core. She had never focused so specifically on one man's face before while doing this. But for some reason she wasn't fully prepared to admit, this time it was working for her.

She remembered the way they had kissed in his apartment, and in his bed. She could picture his face so clearly: the reverence in his blue eyes, the worry in his brow, the pinkness of his flushed lips. Her tongue turned over in her mouth at the thought, and the tingling heat between her legs was rekindled.

Her one hand continued to fondle herself, taking turns rolling each of her breasts in her palm. The other rubbed in circles around her clit. She did so slowly, still sensitive to the touch and building up to the perfect level of arousal. The thought of Deeks' hard body hovering over her helped her get there rather quickly.

She remembered how he had worshipped her body— how he had wanted to warm her up with his mouth first. She regretted now that she had stopped him. But she had thought there would be more time. Instead, when they had finished, they fell asleep in each others arms, blissfully unaware of how their world would be torn apart the next day. But Kensi forced those memories from her head. She was too close to dwell on them.

Instead she focused on him; on how he had made her feel. When she recalled how it had felt to have him inside her, she pushed her fingers further down until two were curling up and into her pussy. It wasn't the same, but if she pretended hard enough, she could almost make herself believe that he was the one bringing her this pleasure again; that he was the one pushing into her, his hard cock filling her completely.

She was breathing more sharply now, and had to actively work at preventing herself from moaning softly like she had each time Deeks pounded into her. _"Oh God, Kens!"_ he had growled against her neck. His words still burned into her memory, and replaying them in her head had almost the same effect her now as they did several weeks ago.

Her toes curled and her shoulders tensed as she neared her climax. She pushed her fingers in further and curled them up to stroke the sensitive, spongy ball of nerves nestled deep within her inner walls. Finally loosing control, her face contorted with the effort of remaining silent and she bit her lip harder than she should have. She welcomed the pulsations of pleasure that coursed through her, and felt her muscles relax.

Immediately she shivered from the cold again. She gave herself a moment to calm down, longing for the warm body of her partner to snuggle against. Her mind was otherwise finally clear, and she felt ready to really sleep. Almost. She first padded off to the head to wash up a bit. No one else was up.

When Kensi returned to her rack and plopped back on her crappy mattress, she smiled to herself sadly and whispered the words she said almost every evening, "Good night, Deeks."

Finally, she drifted off to sleep. But despite being alone and cold, she slept with pleasant dreams of warm California nights spent in bed with her shaggy surfer.

* * *

 **A/N: The next installment will be chapter 15, and will pick up where we last left off: in the middle of season 6. Thanks for bearing with me, especially as my schedule makes it harder to get a chapter out every couple of weeks.**

 **Update: this has since been moved to where it's supposed to be. Ch. 4 is next.**


	4. Upping the Ante

**(Chapter 4: Upping the Ante)**

 **A/N: Skipping ahead, this chapter takes off at the end of 5x20 ('Windfall'). Kensi is finally back, and after avoiding Deeks during her early recovery, now she can't get enough of him.**

 **Update: Formerly chapter 2.**

 **Still rated M.**

* * *

"And there she is," Deeks said, smiling through the pain from the quick jab Kensi had delivered to his shoulder. She had been gone so long that he even missed her playful aggression.

"Here I am," she responded, her gorgeous smile spanning ear to ear.

Kensi waited patiently for Deeks to say whatever he was clearly thinking too hard about. He was just looking at her, smiling, and she realized how much she had missed it. She had thought about his smile a lot while in Afghanistan, but phone pictures just didn't do it justice. Additionally, she had hardly seen him since coming home about a week ago. And the entire time they were together traveling back from Afghanistan his face was unsmiling, showing only a relieved concern as he barely took his eyes off of her.

"Grab some dinner?" he finally asked.

"I don't really feel like going out," she responded flatly.

"Oh," he said, his face falling.

"But, I'm still hungry. We could grab some take out?" she offered as an alternative.

Deeks smiled again, "Yeah! What did you have in mind?"

"Surprise me."

"Okay then, your place or mine?" he asked cheerfully.

Kensi considered the simple question for a moment. She hadn't been to his place since… since before Afghanistan. Her last memories of his apartment were from his bed, waking up contentedly in his arms before heading out to what would become one of the shittiest days she'd experienced in their partnership. She would be happy to go back to his place soon enough, but not tonight.

"My place," she answered simply. "I've got plenty of beers in the fridge."

"That answers my final question. I'll grab some food and I'll see you then!" Deeks said as they headed through the tunnel towards their cars.

Kensi returned home and immediately began second guessing herself. She was restless from being cooped up in ops all day, and so maybe should have accepted the invite to go out. Then again, she and Deeks hadn't really had a chance to talk things through since they returned, and that was entirely her fault. She hadn't actively been avoiding him, but the past several days had been filled with debriefs, doctor exams, psych evals, and doting attention from her mother.

She was trying to come up with a plan; an objective. Something specific she wanted to accomplish this evening. But she didn't know where to start. Things with her partner had been so simple before. Undefined, frustrating, and tense at times. But simple. All of the sudden they were complicated, and despite everything that had happened, she was even less sure of where they stood with each other now.

Before she could make her mind up about what exactly she wanted to say to him, or even if she wanted to say anything at all, Deeks arrived at her door. It was unlocked, so he let himself in. He set their food down on the coffee table and helped himself to a beer from her fridge before settling down on the couch next to her. She couldn't help the smile on her face at how familiar it all was, and not for the first time she thought to herself about how much she had yearned for this while she was away. Granger, Sabatino and the team on the forward operating base were sad company when compared to the shaggy, playful beach boy seated next to her.

As if he could read her mind, Deeks voiced her thoughts out loud. "I've really missed this," he said, cracking a second beer open and passing it to her. "And I'm glad we're getting a chance to catch up. I don't think I could have waited until tomorrow."

Taking the beer he offered to her she responded warmly, "I've missed this too. And I'm sorry we haven't hung out since we came home. I've been busy."

"I'll bet," he agreed, taking a swig from his bottle.

"Really. You wouldn't believe how many people Hetty has had me meet with—"

"Oh, I'd believe it." he interjected. "I had to take a day myself to talk about… things… from Afghanistan as well."

She shared a glance with him, unsure of what in specific he was referring to before continuing, "And my mom! She's hardly left me alone and she doesn't even know the full details about what happened over there. Just that I was 'injured in an altercation while performing my duties in a war zone.'"

"Well that's an oversimplification," he said nonchalantly, clearly trying to stay cool. Switching tones he added, "I've always felt lucky that my mom doesn't know what I actually do. Just that I'm a cop and I ' _sometimes_ ' go undercover, so she shouldn't be too chatty about it."

"Ha!" Kensi laughed theatrically. "'Sometimes.' Right."

They had settled into a comfortable banter again while eating their dinner. Some movie was on in the background but they had more than enough conversation to keep them entertained. They talked about some of the cases Deeks had worked while she was gone. He expressed his relief that her injuries were mostly superficial, and that she didn't have any broken bones. She ribbed him for his joke about Nell starting to fall in love with him.

"You have such a big head," she chided.

"It's just the hair," he corrected her, laughing.

"Oh, I'm sure," she agreed mockingly. "To think Nell could have eyes for anyone who doesn't wear cargo shorts, sandals, and horn-rimmed glasses every day."

"Hey now, you just described young Marty in law school."

"With glasses?" she asked skeptically.

"I didn't need them, no," he admitted. "But honeys in college loved the intellectual hippie look."

"You're delusional."

"Admit it Kens," he persisted, "all my partners eventually come to love me."

"And Sam? Did _he_ fall for you while you've been partnered?" she asked, glossing over his accusation. "'Cause it seems to me that every time you're paired with him, you're lucky to escape without a concussion."

Deeks laughed and leaned into her a little. They had shifted since they finished eating, and their shoulders and thighs now touched.

"Just give it time. Everyone comes around to _The Deeks_ eventually," he stated with confidence.

"Yeah, I suppose they do," Kensi blurted, then blushed a little. It was an innocuous comment that could have been ignored… if it weren't for their thing. "But I don't really feel like sharing my partner," she added quickly. "Not now that you've finally turned into a half-useful pseudo-agent."

"That's the _half_ -nicest _pseudo-_ compliment you've ever given to me, Kens," he said, dramatically holding his hands over his heart. "I might just die of shock!"

"Don't worry," she said calmly, placing one of her hands over his. "I won't be saying anything too nice to you again any time soon. I know how you have a 'natural aversion to death.'"

They had really invaded each other's space now and their faces were only inches apart. For a moment, they just looked at each other, their laughter from moments before just barely faded away. Like their time together all those months ago, Deeks seemed to be waiting for Kensi to make the next move.

"I've really missed you, Kens," he repeated himself from before, the pain and longing evident in his deep blue eyes. "God, I've missed you," he whispered again as she leaned in closer, resting her forehead against his.

She brushed the golden locks from his eyes and let her fingers rest in the scruff of his beard. "It's good to be home," she told him sincerely before ghosting her lips over his.

The tiny amount of contact from her lips was enough to give Deeks the shove he needed. He responded to her barely there caress by capturing her mouth in a hungry kiss. Conscious of the deep tissue bruises she likely still had, he kept his hands on her wrists and forearms. Gently, he coaxed her into laying on top of him, still on her couch.

"Deeks, wait," she told him even as she continued to soundly kiss him. "I'm not… ready."

He pulled back and brushed the hair from her face. "That's Okay," he said sweetly. "We don't have to do this."

"No no, I want to do this now, and I'm _ready_. It's just—" She didn't get a chance to clarify further before Deeks pressed his lips to hers again. "Deeks!" She tried to tell him between kisses. "Really! I haven't… shaved in… in months! The bruises—"

"You think I give a fuck about a little hair, Kens?" he responded in a low gravelly tone. "It's been five months for me too! Your body could be covered in poison ivy and it would still be worth it."

Kensi couldn't help but smile at the revelation that he had waited for her. She moaned into his mouth, and with renewed vigor, continued tugging at his clothes. Once their shirts were gone, their belts unbuckled and their jeans unbuttoned, Deeks started to roll Kensi to her back. He stopped abruptly when she winced in pain.

"You Okay?" he asked, his voice full of concern through his labored breaths.

"Yeah, I'm fine. It's just this couch," she assured him. "Just maybe somewhere with more space? And maybe I should stay on top."

"I think I can handle that," he responded as she tugged him in the direction of her bedroom. The rest of their quickly discarded clothes were left in a trail amongst the clutter on her living room floor.

Deeks had never been in her bedroom before, but was unsurprised to glimpse a pile of plaid shirts, three different gym bags, an open tackle box with several knives and a sharpener, and an overall decorative theme that suggested Kensi had a fondness for assembling inexpensive Swedish furniture. Fortunately, none of these things were on her bed, and Kensi didn't allow him much time to inspect his surroundings before she pushed him down onto her mattress.

From beneath her, Deeks ran his fingers gently up her bare thighs, ass, and back. She felt a shiver that had nothing to do with being naked or cold. Never the less, she pressed herself against him further, trying to make contact with his heated flesh as much as she possibly could.

Deeks' hand moved between them and gently rubbed in circles at the sensitive skin between her legs, inching closer and closer to where she wanted him the most. But he would not make contact. Instead, he gently rolled her to her back again, whispering "Trust me," when she looked at him questioningly.

She did trust him. And the reason for his actions became apparent when instead of hovering over her, he slid down her body, gently kissing near but not on each fading bruise and freshly healed scar he was inspecting for the first time. When he ran his hands down her legs, the hairs he encountered were long enough to be soft, not prickly. Not what he was used to, but not unpleasant either.

Kensi saw the direction of his gaze and reminded him self-consciously, "You don't have to do what I think you're going to do."

"Oh, yes I do," he responded in a husky whisper. "I didn't get to last time, and you won't keep me again from tasting you."

His words sent another quiver through her body, and before she could protest further, his mouth was on her. His tongue was amazing, and what little mental activity she was capable of reminisced back to their time together several months prior, and what a fool she was to have impatiently skipped this part before.

As his tongue worked up, down and around the wetness between her folds, his thumb worked busily at her bundle of nerves. She moaned harshly with each breath and her hands dug into the sheets around her before she relented and ran one through his sandy blonde hair. Her heels dug into his back, she knew she was moments from toppling over the edge. Deeks slipped a single finger inside of her and curled it up, feeling the immediate spasms he had just caused as Kensi cried out his name and a curse word or two.

Deeks showed his surprise when Kensi didn't take a moment to settle down. Instead, she pushed on his shoulders until he rolled over and climbed on top of him, straddling his hips. She took his dick in her hand, already hard and throbbing.

"Condom?" he asked, still breathless.

"I'm fine!" she snapped, startling Deeks into a stunned silence. Her face softened when she saw his tense expression. "I'm sorry, it's just…"

He swallowed hard and took one of her hands in his, gazing up at her expectantly. With concern he asked, "Kens?"

She sighed, distracting him slightly as she resumed idly stroking his at length. "Even though I told them dozens of times that nothing… like… what they were asking me about had happened to me in the desert," she stumbled through her sentence, unable to use the word 'rape.' She had been threatened, of course. But ever alert for rescue attempts, her captors didn't keep them in one place long enough to get more than some quick questions and… beatings in.

"I'm sorry, Kensi. You don't have to talk about—"

"It's okay!" she assured him. Keeping an impressive check on her composure she continued, "The doctors still tested me for everything known to man during my exams. And I've been back on the pill long enough again," she added matter of factly.

"Okay, then," Deeks said through a soft smile, relieved to hear the answer he was hoping for to a question he had been too afraid to ask.

"We probably should have talked about protection last time," she went on. She still had his cock in her hand and it was getting difficult for him to comprehend her words. "But I assume you'd have never screwed me over."

"Didn't I?" he asked through a short laugh, glad to see that the tense moment had passed.

"I meant in a bad way, ass!" she scolded as she pinched one of his nipples playfully.

"Never," he conceded, brushing the hair from her face before pulling her down for a deep kiss. It was tender and sweet, and Deeks poured all of the adoration he had for her into it.

As their tongues and lips dueled for control, she positioned the tip of his erection at her entrance and sank down slowly. Kensi sighed and Deeks groaned in satisfaction, placing his hands on her hips to hold her in place before he completely lost his composure.

After a few seconds of stillness broken only by their heavy breathing, Kensi shifted slightly to get him to move. Mindful of her bruises, Deeks kept his movements slow and his hands low. He pushed and pulled with a steady rhythm as she rocked against him.

It was a slow burn, but one that allowed for her to feel every inch of his length as he slid in and out. As the tightness in her walls began to build again, she tried to shift forward and up the pace, but ended up whimpering at the sharp pain of one of her sore ribs colliding with his chin.

"Shhhhh," he whispered to her, lightly kissing her chest. "Slowly, Kens."

She pressed herself flat against him again and busied her lips with his. Still grinding her hips in time with his steady thrusts, Kensi no longer tried to dictate the pace. She was more than satisfied with the intensity of his slow, yet purposeful movements.

Deeks shifted a hand between their bodies and pressed a thumb into the nub just above where she was on fire for him. She hadn't even realized how close she was, but that little extra contact was all it took to ignite her second orgasm, even more powerful than the first.

"Oh. My. God. Deeks…" she moaned out, her words broken by her sharp gasps for air.

He was showing no signs of stopping. Deeks stayed buried deep within her but continued rocking his hips slowly while he waited for her inner muscles to release their pulsating grip on him. He eventually began to move again, his strokes made easier by how wet and slick she now was around him.

Kensi was simply clinging to his shoulders as tightly as her spent muscles would allow. The noises she made in his ear were barely whispers and it was the best she had felt at least since the last time they had sex, and possibly ever.

When she gently bit his ear lobe, her hot breath on the corner of his jaw, he finally lost it. Calling out her name, he pulled her hips down onto him one last time and came; his mouth latched onto her shoulder. Kensi had moaned loudly again, and he could still feel her walls fluttering around him. She was unsure if she had come a third time or if this was left over from the second. She was thoroughly sated however, and had collapsed on top of Deeks; draped over his chest like a wet blanket.

"You okay?" he asked yet again through shaky breaths.

"Mh-hmh," she answered in the affirmative against the overheated skin of his neck. Reluctantly, she rolled off of him to give their bodies a chance to cool off. "Much better than okay."

Now able to look into her eyes, Deeks only smiled warmly in response. After a few moments more, she pulled her sheets up around their now chilled bodies and allowed Deeks to be the big spoon, enveloping her in his long arms.

Kensi lay with her naked back pressed against his bare chest; his arms wrapped snuggly around her. She gently stroked his forearms as she fought off sleep, remembering that she had intended to talk with him about where they stood. Oh well. They'll just have to talk next time. And with the happy confidence that there would be a 'next time,' she drifted into a gentle slumber.

* * *

 **A/N: Thank you so much for the reviews and follows so far.**


	5. Blind Bets

**(Chapter 5: Blind Bets)**

 **A/N: I swear I'm not normally this fast of a writer. But for once, I don't have a gigantic to-do list for spring break. Real life begins again next week, but I might have chapter 4 finished by then.**

 **This chapter takes place the day after the last chapter, and after 5x21 ("Three Hearts") and the infamous 'box.'**

 **Not to spoil it or anything, but this chapter is still rated M. Very M.**

* * *

Kensi sat anxiously at the wheel of her car, drumming her fingers on the steering wheel. She was a block and a half up the street from Deeks' apartment and couldn't decide whether or not to get out of her car. She was still reeling from everything they had said to each other that day, the skin-crawling interrogation they had conducted with Paul Angelo, and of course their symbolic exchange of knives and boxes.

Her morning had started so pleasantly: she had woken up in her bed, 'star-fishing' across his body; she had actually felt _satisfied_ for the first time in months— since just before she had been sent to Afghanistan. He had to get up and leave quite early to race home and deal with Monty.

The extra time she then had from waking up so early allowed her to take a longer shower. Hopeful that there would be a repeat of last night and satisfied enough with the progress her bruises and cuts had made, she undertook the daunting task of removing five months worth of body hair. Despite what Deeks had sweetly told her, she just didn't feel like herself until it was under control again.

She had arrived at the mission to see him doing paperwork with the assistance of her father's knife. Through their morning banter, they had made tentative plans to meet up, and it seemed to Kensi that their thing was finally heading in the right direction. She wasn't even annoyed when Eric interrupted them, because she was finally cleared to be back in the field.

As the day wore on, it became clear to her that Deeks was far more affected by the insinuations made of them by Paul Angelo. Deeks had risen to the bait laid out by the traitorous now ex-NCIS agent, and fell into his trap of self-doubt. Kensi had experienced a mixture of guilt and flattery when Deeks admitted to her that if he ever went rogue, she would be the reason. And later, he had returned her knife.

 _The knife_ … When she gave it to him for protection months earlier, he had asked her if it were more symbolic; if it meant they were actually together. She insisted it was just a knife, though he clearly didn't see it that way. All of these metaphors, and all of these games they played were driving her up the wall.

But it was his words to her earlier that evening as he gave the knife back that confused her the most. " _Contrary to hundreds of years of scientific evidence, I believe raccoons_ do _mate for life."_ Why were things so complicated? Why couldn't he just say what he meant?

She shook her head at herself when she thought about the box. A year old prank she tried to play on Deeks that had now become so much more. She reluctantly admitted to herself that she was as guilty as him in their lack of communication. But that was why she was here, a block away from his house at 8:30 in the evening. She was going to get clarification, regardless of what it meant for them.

Having finally strengthened her resolve, Kensi pulled her keys from the ignition and got out of her car. As she walked to his door, she wondered if she should have warned him she was coming. Before she could finish that line of thinking, she saw him exiting his apartment with keys in one hand and a dog on his leash in the other. Deeks spotted her before he could lock his door behind him.

"Heading out with Monty?" Kensi called to the pair cheerily.

"Yeah. Actually, we were just going to head over to see you," he replied, clearly a little surprised at seeing her there. He then added, "If that's okay… Monty hasn't seen you since you came home, and—" he cleared his throat quickly, "and he said he's missed you too."

Kensi smiled at the mangy hound who was whining and straining against his leash to get to her. She knelt down to greet the dog once she and Deeks were finally standing close enough for his leash to reach her. Her kindness was rewarded with a wet nose to the face and dog kisses on her chin.

"Oh, yes Monty! I've missed you too! Yes, I have!" she affectionately informed the dog. She scratched at his ears and rib cage while his propeller tail picked up speed.

"You wanna come inside?" Deeks asked after a few more moments of watching the happy reunion.

"Sure. That's… why I'm here." she responded.

Once in Deeks' apartment, Kensi sat on the couch and Monty cuddled up right next to her, desperate for more affection.

"Beer?" Deeks called out to her from the kitchen.

Kensi briefly thought that she'd probably prefer a glass of whiskey after the day they'd had. Instead she answered with a simple, "Sure! Whatever is fine."

Joining her on the couch with a pair of opened brews, Deeks also joined in the Monty affection-fest. "This why you came over? To see Monty?" he asked.

"Um… Yes…" Kensi answered slowly, trailing off while she considered how to elaborate on the truth. "And I guess, to talk… about… things."

Deeks nodded to himself, but focused his eyes on his beer. "What's in the box?" he asked her suddenly, grinning just a tiny bit.

"The… you opened it, didn't you?" she responded quizzically, raising her eyebrows at him.

"The outer one. Not the little one inside!" he exclaimed. "What's in _that_ box?"

"Am I stopping you from opening it?" she inquired.

"No."

"Well, it seems to me, you're the only one who wants to wait," she said bluntly. Then added, "To… open the box."

He was staring at her intently now. The tension of the moment broken only by the happy tail wags of the dog still nestled between them.

"Why did you give me my knife back?" she asked in turn.

"Because it's yours," he responded simply. "A knife is just a knife, but this one is special to you. And it belongs with you."

She shook her head slowly, "We can't keep lying to each other—"

"I'm not lying!" he interjected.

"Withholding the truth, then," she clarified, intent on actually starting the conversation she had been planning and dreading for the last couple of days. "Hiding how we feel, from each other… even from ourselves."

"Even if I'm bad at explaining it, you know how I feel about you. That hasn't changed!" Deeks assured her.

"Then what _has_ changed?" she asked. "Because even yesterday you seemed ready to… I don't know… Work out our… thing?"

"Our thing—"

"Our _relationship,_ Deeks," Kensi explicated as Deeks simply looked at her almost sadly.

"I was…" he trailed off. "But now…"

"But now? Don't tell me you let that asshole Angelo get to you. He was playing us, Deeks!"

"It's not just what he said," Deeks said defensively. "It's what I… I know what…" he sighed in exasperation at himself. "I'm _afraid_ of what I'd do, what I'm capable of doing, if… something ever happened to you."

Kensi continued looking into Deeks' pained features. Not for the first time since she came home, Kensi wondered what specifically Deeks wasn't telling her. But before she could decide how exactly to ask him, Deeks continued speaking.

"I need to figure some things out, Kens."

"We could figure them out together?" she offered.

"I know. And we will… just not _together_ , together," he specified. "Not yet."

Kensi sighed and pushed aside the observation that Deeks' vocabulary always seemed to dwindle in size when he spoke about his feelings. A long pause hung in the air between them.

"So, what? We just go back to the way things were before?" she asked.

"No," he replied slowly. "I don't think we can ever fully go back. And I don't want to. But just…Hit the breaks a little bit."

Kensi nodded slightly but kept her jaw clenched shut. Fearful that tears might be forming, she abandoned her untouched beer, rose from the couch and made her way towards the door. She murmured back, "Goodnight, Deeks."

"Kens!" he called out, getting up off the couch and following after her. Grabbing her hand he said softly, "You don't have to go."

Keeping her hand in his she turned to look at him, tears welling up in her eyes. "Why should I stay?"

"Because I need you to know that I'm going to figure this out. And we're going to make this work… some day. Soon," he promised.

She shook her head and closed her eyes as he gently brushed away a fallen tear from her cheek. "How long am I going to have to wait?"

"Not too long," he assured her prior to adding, "I hope. What can I do to show you I mean it?"

She considered him a moment before suggesting the only thing that occurred to her. "Kiss me? Something for me to hold on to while I wait?"

The corners of his mouth curved up almost imperceptibly. He leaned forward, pressing his mouth gently over hers. Kensi's breath caught in her lungs. As she pulled back, Deeks leaned forward, chasing after her lips with his. Without hesitation Kensi stepped forward to meet them, stealing a second, deeper kiss. His hands wrapped around her waist as her hands found his shoulders and he moaned as she broke the kiss a second time.

"I thought we were going to slow down?" she asked.

"I… uh…" is all Deeks could manage in response, his face already flush and his lips plump from their embrace.

"One more time?" Kensi offered, smiling mischievously.

"You're killing me!" Deeks relented before slanting his open mouth over hers again, his tongue eagerly meeting hers as she allowed him access.

For a reluctant lover, Deeks shed his clothes and Kensi's with remarkable speed. By the time they made it back to his bedroom, she was completely naked and he was wearing only his underwear; though they were already down around his ankles.

They fell back onto his bed, and Deeks continued to kiss Kensi with a sense of desperation. She hoped it was out of passion and not the fear that they may not do this again for some time. With that thought in mind, she rolled him onto his back. Now atop him, she pressed a trail of open mouthed kisses down his jaw and neck, pausing to suck at his racing pulse points.

Deeks groaned and reached down to caress whatever of Kensi's exposed skin he could reach. She had continued her descent down his body; kissing his broad chest, running her tongue across his nipples, giggling when his muscles twitched at the sensation. Her hands replaced her lips, pressing against his tight abs as she shifted further down, her hot breath finally coming in contact with his stiffening erection.

She looked up at Deeks who was breathlessly watching her from the head of his bed, and then she cupped his balls before running the palm of her hand up his length. A few times she stroked him, appreciating the soft skin sliding over the hard tissue within; growing harder by the second. She rubbed her thumb around the smooth skin at the tip before taking him into her mouth.

Deeks groaned loudly and his head hit the pillow with force. Kensi hummed in amusement to herself and as she did so, she could feel his thighs clench beneath her touch. His hands wandered; one stroked the hair out of her face and the other clenched at the sheets beside him. Kensi could tell he was trying to restrain himself from thrusting up into her apparently talented mouth.

She worked at his cock with lips and tongue, taking his generous length into her mouth as far as she could and attending to the rest with her hand. Occasionally, she would release him and swirl her tongue around the head, or tease at the sensitive bunch of skin just below the underside of his tip. Each time she did so he would moan loudly, his breaths sharp and broken.

"Kensi!" he finally managed. "You have to stop that!"

Releasing him with a pop but keeping a firm grip at his base she rebutted, "No. No I don't."

He couldn't argue with that, and she had already returned her mouth to its lascivious task. She took great pleasure and no small amount of pride in watching how thoroughly Deeks was enjoying himself. Though she may not admit it, Kensi was also making damn sure that if this was the last time they would be fucking for a while, that he would have one hell of a memory to keep in his thoughts at night.

Kensi resisted two more of Deeks' attempts to pull her face back up to his, but he had very little fight left in him. She had her free hand on his thighs and could feel his butt clench and his muscles tighten, so she was not surprised when he called out a warning to her.

"Kensi, I'm so close!" he whispered harshly. Followed shortly by, "Oh my God, Kens! _Fuck_!"

Taking him as deep as she was able, she pumped furiously at his exposed shaft, swallowing what he gave her and teasing his still pulsating cock with her tongue. Finally she released him from her mouth, but continued gently stroking his dick, just barely beginning to soften in her hand.

Deeks was boneless and breathless beneath her, but was finally successful at pulling her lips back to his. He held her tight and kissed her languidly through her smile and gentle laugh.

"What?" he asked at her amusement.

"Never had a guy want to kiss after that," she stated affectionately.

"I'd guess not too many would even be able to move after that," he replied.

"But you're different?" she inquired, already pretty sure of the answer.

"Give me a few minutes, and I'll show you," he responded cockily, a glimpse of her old Deeks showing through. "In the mean time…"

Rather than finishing his thought, he rolled her and pinned her shoulders down in his pillows. He kissed her for several minutes of what felt like heaven, his tongue showing hers appreciation for what she'd just done. He tugged gently at her lower lip before starting his own downward journey, exploring her curves and heated skin along the way.

Kensi felt he was taking too long on his way to his destination, but he clearly had an appreciation for her perfect breasts. He spent nearly a minute on each; rolling her hard nipples gently between his thumb and forefinger, then sucking at the delicate flesh. Her flushed skin felt chilled where his wet kisses had been, his saliva making it sensitive to the cool air of the room. But the shiver that rushed over her as he reached her upper thighs had nothing to do with the ambient temperature.

She was already so worked up that lightly grazing the engorged bundle of nerves between her legs made her twitch and writhe in pleasure. It seemed to Kensi that Deeks intended to tease her. After the initial contact, he focused his tongue's ministrations on her inner folds and the skin around her glistening pussy. She let out a pathetic whimper, frustrated at his divided attention.

After a minute that felt like an hour he finally returned his tongue to her clit and sucked the nub between his lips. Kensi hadn't realized she was so close, but at his touch she thrust her hips into his face and cried out at her orgasm. Deeks moaned into her and happily lapped up her sweet release, holding her hips in place as she continued to wriggle in his arms.

Deeks shifted up over her again to claim her lips for the thousandth time that evening. Kensi broke the kiss to glance down when she felt his girth against her thigh, and holy hell! He was already rock hard again.

He wasted no time in joining them together, and Kensi squirmed at the delicious sensation of being completely filled by him. The pace he set was impressive given how winded they both still were. Yet she met him stroke for stroke, lifting her hips into his to gain that little extra friction. All thoughts from the night before of being gentle were forgotten in their frenzied desperation.

She pushed up on her elbows to better reach his lips with hers and he took it as an opportunity to wrap his arms below her back, pulling them as tightly together as he could. Her breasts pressed flat against his chest, she broke their kiss only to nibble at the hard muscle at the base of his neck.

Deeks' long strokes had really gained speed, and Kensi could feel her inner muscles trembling again. It was the start of a new orgasm, but it was drawing on and on.

" _Deeks_! Please don't stop! Don't—" she cried out, no longer able to raise her hips in time with his. Deeks showed no intention of stoping, and continued to thrust into her, growling with each breath. Kensi had believed she was already coming. So when she crested a new, even higher peak, she was completely unable to form coherent sentences and allowed a stream of whimpers and curse words to escape with her heavy breaths.

Deeks could no longer delay his release and continue, even if it weren't for her pulsating walls pulling him over the edge. Driving into her hard, he growled her name and came. He pressed his cheek into hers, his muscles shaking with the effort of not collapsing on top of her. Kensi whined when he pulled out, and he shifted down her body just enough to bury his face in her breasts. Neither were able or willing to move for several more minutes.

"Hey, Kens?" he asked, his voice muffled by her soft flesh.

"Yeah Deeks?"

"The box is just filled with more boxes. Isn't it?"

She could feel his playful smile against her breast. She stroked his damp hair while she considered her response.

"I guess you'll have to open it and find out."

* * *

An hour later, Kensi lay beside a very sated and sleeping Deeks, her head tucked between his arm and his chest. She would have almost felt guilty about enticing him when he was clearly conflicted— had he not been so eager to comply, so fervent in his efforts, and so peacefully content when it ended.

Still, as frustrated as she was with the idea of taking a break from this aspect of their relationship, Kensi knew she should wait for him to make the next move in the future. The last thing she wanted to do was to rush him into committing to something he wasn't ready for. She also knew that all of this was a huge gamble with their partnership. Deeks was clearly playing his cards close to his chest. She was willing to bet that they would indeed figure out how to make this work. But only time would tell if her bet would pay off.

* * *

 **A/N: Woof. That was a doozy to get through. Drama is not as comfortable for me as humor is, nor as gratifying as the hot scenes. But I swear the drama has a purpose. On a side note, my word processor is telling me this document has breached 10,500 words (counting the notes, excerpts from future chapters and outlines written). So that's fun.**

 **Thanks for sticking with this story! And thanks for the reviews, favs and follows!**


	6. The Deal

**(Chapter 6: The Deal)**

 **A/N: As I had hoped, I managed to finish this one before the end of the weekend. I've started chapter 5, but it may be a few (or several) days before it's ready to post. Thanks for sticking with this story!**

 **Tag to 5x22 ("One More Chance"). Kensi and Deeks struggle with the concept of 'slowing down.'**

 **Rating: M**

 **Maybe I should just warn you if I ever write a chapter that isn't? Then you'll know to not bother reading.**

* * *

Why did he think he could do this? It had been a strained couple of weeks since he had given into Kensi's suggestion that they go at it 'one more time' before pausing the progression of their relationship and slowing things down. Deeks was four miles in to a long run, but a full marathon wouldn't be enough to burn off the tension he was feeling.

At first things were fine. Both he and Kensi had come to work the morning after and picked up their usual banter with each other and the team as if nothing had happened between them. They had even continued hanging out alone after work some days like they had in the past. The looks they shared were perhaps held a little longer, and the air between them charged a little more. They hand't broached the subject of their tabled relationship, and thus far, hadn't relapsed and fallen into bed again.

Deeks had a good grasp on his outer emotions. Inside, he was in turmoil. He waffled back and forth daily on why exactly he insisted on taking a break. Inevitably, he always remembered his reasons. Fortunately, he was also able to appear at ease and comfortable around her again. Granted, it took all of Deeks' undercover prowess to pull it off, but he felt like he did so successfully. That is, until yesterday.

The team had caught a case through an old connection of Sam's, and it involved a missing little girl so all emotions were running high. It was while Deeks and Kensi were following up a lead at a trailer home that Deeks first slipped up.

As was all too common in their daily lives, the trailer was rigged to blow. As they fled the impending explosion, Deeks actually _tackled_ Kensi in an effort to shield her. His body covered hers for only a few seconds, and they were both wearing thick layers of clothing; not to mention there was flaming debris that had settled around them. Never the less, he felt a tug in his gut and at his heart at the brief contact.

She'd brushed it off, socked him in the shoulder playfully and reminded him that he didn't have to protect her. But he knew he did. He absolutely did. If not for her sake than for his. He was finally ready to admit in his head that he loved her. He absolutely, definitively, and irrevocably loved her. Therein was the problem. It's not that he thought it would be an issue working together as partners. In fact, it would probably be worse if they were split up. But he was dead seriously afraid of what he might do, who he might hurt, and what lines he might cross… again, if she ever came to be in serious danger.

If having his body pressed to hers weren't torture enough, Kensi had gone and unknowingly twisted the screw in his aching heart even further later that day. In retrospect, having her throw her cup of scalding coffee into his face as a plausible distraction may have been less painful than gently wrapping her arms around his neck and pressing her lips to his cheek; giggling in his ear and smiling at him softly. He knew that smile well enough to know she likely wasn't faking it; that she was probably hurting too. But that didn't make him feel any better.

They'd gone out for drinks after the case and Granger had invited himself along. While the grouchy old bastard was growing on him, he couldn't help but get the feeling that the Assistant Director was watching the partners quite closely the whole time; shrewdly observing how they interacted together. Deeks tried to shake that line of thinking from his head, fearful of what future consequences his paranoid mind might come up with.

He focused harder on keeping up the brisk pace of his run. He was falling behind and getting distracted, which was understandable given that it was his partner's long legs and shapely rear end that were jogging just a few steps in front of him.

"Come on, Deeks!" Kensi called back to him. "Only a mile and a half until we're back to your place."

"Or," he answered, a little more out of breath than she was. "It's only a quarter of a mile to that taqueria by the park!"

"Nope!" she replied. "Then we'd have to do the last mile with taco-bellies! Let's go, partner! Pick up the pace and get that heart rate up!"

Deeks simply groaned in exasperation and pushed himself to lengthen his stride. He left unsaid the fact that his heart always beat faster near her.

Several minutes later, the pair reached Deeks' apartment building. She was still limber, and bouncing after their run. He was putting on a show of exaggerating how out of breath he was.

"Seriously, though," Deeks continued, suddenly in control of his breathing. "What should we do for lunch?"

"I'm cool with anything," Kensi answered, rummaging through his cupboards for a drinking glass. "But I have to run home and shower first. And _where_ are your glasses, Deeks?" she finished, standing on her toes to peer at the back of an empty cupboard shelf.

"The dishwasher," he answered cooly. "Some of us actually put our dirty dishes there, and don't just leave them in, around, or sort of near the sink."

Deeks came up behind her to reach for one of the smaller glasses she likely couldn't see at the back of the top shelf. Not knowing he was there, Kensi turned and stepped right into him. Her hands came up to his chest to steady herself. He was still reaching for the glass, but froze and looked down at her. He seemed to be barely drawing breath.

Kensi hid the expressions of what she was feeling, but met his steady gaze. "Um… Deeks…?"

Deeks had started breathing again. He took in her scent so close to him; a little sweaty, yet spicy and intoxicating… and always reminiscent of gunpowder. He set the glass he had retrieved on the counter, and shifted back from her space a little bit. Then he thought better of it and stepped forward again, cupping her surprised face in his hands and covering her mouth with his.

After a moment or two of shock, Kensi sank into the kiss and moaned a little as she mouthed at his lips with hers. Then quite suddenly, she pulled away and invoked a disappointed groan from him.

"Deeks? What are you doing?" she asked flatly.

"Kissing the most beautiful woman I've ever seen?" he offered helpfully.

"I mean where is this going?" she asked again.

"I don't know."

"Are you ready for it to go somewhere?" she inquired hopefully.

"I don't know."

"What happened to slowing down?" she shook her head at him, growing more frustrated even as he continued to hold her in place.

"I don't know… And who fucking cares?" he asked softly before pressing his lips to hers again.

She allowed him to kiss her for several sweet moments before answering him. "I do! I care! About you, about us. I need to know what this is."

He shook his head helplessly at her, his blue eyes boring deep into her brown ones. "I don't know what to call this," he said softly, motioning between them. "I don't want to get into something serious only to blow it all and ruin our partnership down the line. Or worse, get someone hurt or killed because I'm focused only on you and not the mission." His features softened before he continued. "But I know what I want."

"And what's that?" she asked in barely a whisper, more eager to hear his answer than to admonish him for his dark logic.

"You, and only you."

Whatever defenses Kensi had up before were ultimately lowered as Deeks moved into her space a third time. Their lips met with renewed vigor and her hands ran up his chest to rest at his neck.

Deeks pressed her body against his kitchen counter, his hands sneaking under the tight fabric of her running tank top to feel the hot, damp skin beneath.

"Deeks…" she tried to pull away from him, but his insatiable lips stayed flush with hers. "Deeks, I'm dirty—"

"Yeah?" he smiled.

"And sweaty—" she added.

"I know—"

"And smelly—!"

"I don't care!" he responded with finality.

Relenting to his greedy kisses, Kensi offered an alternative. "Shower first?"

"Deal," he agreed.

She pushed him back towards his hallway. Kicking off her running shoes and pulling at the drawstring of his shorts, she raised her arms only long enough for Deeks to peel her top and sports bra from her shoulders. They had barely managed to divest themselves fully of their clothing before they reached his shower. Kensi turned the tap and pulled them into the cool stream without waiting for the water to adjust.

They refrained from kissing for a few moments to slow their sharp breaths as the cold water washed over them, gradually warming. Deeks' eyes wandered ravenously over her torso. Her tanned skin stretched tight across toned muscles in some places, and soft curves in others. Kensi was herself taking in the sight of Deeks' agile body; each of his numerous well defined muscles appearing even more distinct from their recent exercise.

"Huh," she said as her eyes wandered south.

"What?" Deeks asked distressed, seeing the direction of her gaze.

"Nothing. Just…" Kensi smiled, "I haven't actually seen you… _soft_ , before now."

"What? Yes you have," he countered. "We've been together how many times now?

"This will make four—"

"But who's counting?" Deeks interjected, smiling against her cheek as he began to kiss her again.

"No, really," she continued. "It's always been dark, or we were under the covers or something. I've only ever had eyes on it while it's been _hard_."

"Well, I've only been _uncovered_ around you at times where staying soft would have been impossible. Seeing you naked is more than enough for me," he explained.

"And right now?" Kensi asked, motioning to their wet, nude bodies.

"Hey now," Deeks teased. "This water isn't the warmest."

"Don't worry, partner," Kensi said in a low voice, taking his actually _not_ completely flaccid dick in her hand. "I'll take care of you."

Deeks hissed when she tugged at him expertly, her hands gliding across his slick skin. He steadied himself by leaning into her, pushing her back against the shower tiles.

"We should… probably wash up," Kensi suggested, even as she maintained a hold on him. Deeks only nodded in response and reached for the bottle of soap, pouring a generous amount and lathering it directly in his hands. "What, no loofa?" Kensi asked.

"Where's the fun in that?" Deeks replied before placing his soapy hands on her shoulders and massaging the soap into her soft skin.

Kensi moaned softly in appreciation as his strong hands worked their way down and back up her arms, then inward to her chest. His wandering caresses paid extra attention to her breasts; cupping each at the same time and running his thumb pads over her hardening nipples. He traced his fingers lightly down her rib cage and to her abs before rubbing her stomach. Kensi jumped slightly, and Deeks smiled as he realized she was a little ticklish.

She gave him a silent look of warning as she took the bottle of soap herself. Her hands traced a similar path as his; beginning on his shoulders and rubbing at his deltoids and biceps, both sets of muscles were too large for her to wrap her long fingers around. When her fingers reached his broad chest, she lightly dragged her short nails across his flesh, eliciting a sharp breath from Deeks that had nothing to do with pain.

Kensi was plainly disappointed that he was not ticklish as she ran her hands across his taut stomach and around his sides to reach his back. Once she had finished with his back, her own chest pressed snuggly to his, she let her hands wander down to squeeze his butt.

"Turn around," he instructed, "and let me get your back."

She did as he requested while he added more soap to his palm. His attentions to her back were more of a massage than a scrubbing, and Kensi hummed in appreciation. She leaned back into him to allow the shower to wash more of the suds off of her body. As she did so, Deeks dropped a kiss to her shoulder and allowed his hands to migrate around her hips.

He moaned softly into her neck; he knew he shouldn't be doing this. He knew even as he held her in his arms that he had been holding her at arms length these past weeks to prevent exactly this from happening again. He knew it wasn't fair to her, but fuck it all if he could stop now. Not with those noises she was making as she writhed into his touch.

Kensi placed her hands on his forearms, guiding his hands from the wetness of her skin to a different sort of wetness between her legs. Deeks got the message and pressed his fingers into her. With his left arm, he held her waist against him while his right hand rubbed at her bundle of nerves. She still had her hand pressing on his, willing him to give her more.

Her legs were pressed tightly together, so as he delved deeper into her folds, the sensations he caused made her knees go weak and she sank back further into his chest. Despite the sound of the rushing water, Kensi's restrained cries echoed off of the hard tiled walls of the shower.

As she quickly succumbed to the waves of pleasure, Kensi dug her fingers into Deeks' wrists and rolled her head back in to the crook of his neck. Deeks kissed and sucked at her neck and collar bone, helping her ride out the last spasms of her climax.

Deeks knew Kensi had to notice his now sizable erection pressing into her lower back. She released his forearms and leaned forward against the shower wall, lifting a leg to rest on the inner edge of the tub, and to grant him access.

He held her hips in place with one hand while he shifted into position, guiding himself to her entrance. She was still sensitive from her first orgasm, and whimpered when his tip nudged along the lips of her welcoming heat and against her clit. He pulled back slightly until he found the right spot, then pushed in slowly. The warm water on his dick mixed with her natural moisture to create a new kind of friction. Deeks almost lost it at that, and at the tightness he felt around his cock from the position they were in.

She pushed her hips back into him as best as she could to urge him deeper. He moved inside her slowly; to make sure they could keep their balance, and to make sure they both felt every sensation— every burst of of pleasure as he pulled the head of his cock nearly all the way out, then filled her up completely again with smooth thrusts. Over and over, faster and faster, until each of their quick breaths accompanied a stifled moan.

Deeks was succumbing to a sensory overload: the sight of water cascading over her body, her breasts pressed flush against the tiles, and his dick moving in and out of her; the feel of her tight pussy around him, and of her hand tucked behind her head to pull at the hairs on his neck; the sound of her increasingly wanton cries, each let out in time with the beat of his thighs colliding with her perfect ass; the taste of her skin as he latched onto her shoulder with his tongue and lips; the strong scent of soap, the faint smell of sweat, and the distinct aroma of sex as Kensi came closer and closer to her peak.

It was overwhelming. Unable to contain himself any longer, Deeks emptied his seed deep within her after a final thrust and a growl of her name.

"Fuck, Deeks!" she moaned as she continued to grind her hips back into him.

One of his hands journeyed downward once again to toy with the throbbing nub beneath her folds. Though spent, he kept moving inside her while he still could. His efforts were rewarded when Kensi came again at his masterful touch, and his now _very_ sensitive dick could feel every pulsing flex of her enveloping walls.

The water of the shower had grown cold again, helping to cool their heated bodies. Each took a moment to wash the results of their union off of themselves. Deeks had intended to take Kensi in his arms and kiss her again, but she had already turned the water off and stepped out of the shower in search of a towel.

* * *

At Kensi's request, Deeks dressed himself and went to her car to retrieve her emergency go-bag for the clean clothes it contained. When he returned, she had wrapped herself in a towel and was looking out his bedroom window at the six inches of beach you could see through the gaps in his neighboring buildings.

She finally met his gaze again when he handed her duffle over. "Should I stay?" she asked with just a hint of hopefulness on her otherwise expressionless face.

"Of course you should stay," Deeks responded immediately, taken aback by her question. He took a step closer to her, watching her with concern.

"What exactly are we doing?" she asked, holding her ground and keeping her arms crossed around her towel-clad chest.

Deeks was reminded of a time he'd seen Kensi in a towel two years ago when she had appeared much the same, and was just as perturbed with him. He answered as casually as he could, "I thought we were getting lunch?"

"Dammit, Deeks."

He paused a moment, not even remotely surprised by her frustrated answer. Her shoulders dropped and she sighed as she shot an exasperated look at him.

He shook his head and raised his eyebrows with genuine confusion as he said, "I just don't want to put a label on what we have. Call it cowardice or call it superstition, but I haven't actually used the word 'girlfriend' in a very long time." At her continued frown, he added, "Is this is a problem?"

"It doesn't have to be," she asserted. "I could help you— _we_ could work through this. If you'd just tell me what's going on with you."

"I will," he assured her.

"When?"

He stepped forward again and brushed a stray hair from her troubled features. ' _When I'm sure you won't bolt when you hear what I have to tell you,'_ he thought to himself. Out loud he continued, "When I'm able to trust myself enough to talk about it."

Kensi sighed and began to stroke at his chest with the tips of her fingers. "Can we at least agree that trying to keep our hands off of each other isn't working?"

"I think that is evident," he agreed.

She chuckled softly. "Then promise me you'll tell me when you're ready. For now," she sighed again, "I guess we can keep this casual."

While that was far from what he actually wanted, he was convinced in that moment that it was for the best. He smiled and kissed the top of her head. Deeks lowered his lips to hers, and before taking them in a soft kiss he answered, "Deal."

* * *

 **A/N: Just so you know, coming up with reasons to keep them 'officially' not together is every bit as frustrating as watching several seasons of the show's writers do the same.**


	7. Burn Card

**(Chapter 7: Burn Card)**

 **A/N: Tag to 6x01 ("Deep Trouble: Part 2"). Our favorite loosely defined relationship is about as much of a hot mess as you'd expect**

 **Rating: Still M… I haven't run out of ways to describe mature scenes quite yet.**

* * *

' _This isn't helping_ ,' a little voice in the back of Kensi's head informed her against her will. She shut it out and tried to focus on much more pleasant things: like running her hands through her partner's soft hair; or the feel of his strong arms wrapped around her waist as he held her up against his hard body in the foyer of his apartment; or the taste of rum and cervezas on his tongue and lips as they mingled with hers.

They had settled into a predictable routine these past few weeks of seeking comfort in each other's embrace after especially tough cases, boring slow days, frustratingly long commutes, disappointing take-out orders; really anything. And each time Kensi found herself in bed with him (or shower, or couch, or where ever), she wondered when he would broach the subject of their non-official romance like he promised he would.

Kensi chastised herself for being so impatient to truly call him her own. She considered such sentiments to be against her normal character, but had to admit to herself that the deeper she got into it with him, the more she wanted assurances that this was serious; that this was worth risking their partnership— and the most important friendship in her life for. She was more than a little terrified because they'd already crossed a line many times over that she swore she'd never cross.

She also swore she wasn't desperate enough for his touch to come to him again so soon. But she was addicted to him: his scent, the feel of his scruff on her face, his cocky grin, the ring of deep blue in his sky colored eyes as they stared affectionately into hers. Everything.

Deeks had backed her gently against the nearest wall. She lifted an ankle to rub against the calf of the leg he had placed between hers, drawing a moan from him as their hips collided. Her hands had moved to his chest, wandering downward of their own accord and tracing the ridges of his abs.

Nothing they were doing at the moment was helping the pair 'get ahold of their feelings' or 'put their partnership first,' as they had agreed to do. For the most part, she couldn't complain. They were no longer remaining frustratingly celibate and had given into the unrelenting gravity of their mutual attraction. But Deeks had insisted he wasn't ready for their relationship to be more than casual.

They saw each other at their jobs every day. They hung out most days after work and most weekends just for fun. And they slept together a couple of times a week. She had no idea what it was that separated their arrangement from an actual relationship other than the words used to describe it. But she was convinced that the longer this went on, the more likely she was to get burned.

She knew it wasn't because he was seeing other women. He hadn't even mentioned going on a date with someone else for over a year. What's more, she hadn't really seen him look at another woman besides herself since some months before his own experience with torture not quite a year ago.

Yes, saying it had been a rough year on the partners was a gross understatement. And something that he had experienced in that time was holding him back. She just didn't know which specific turd from the shit heap that was the last twelve months was the cause of his ambiguous intentions.

However, she was pretty sure about what his intentions were at that particular moment, because she could feel his _intention_ poking into her just below her waist. Her hands had reached his belt and she let her palms splay against the skin beneath his shirt, already radiating heat. His kisses grew sloppier and more desperate at her touch. Her palms followed the trail of fine golden hairs beneath his waist line until they just barely brushed against the base of his growing hardness.

Deeks groaned again and pulled his lips from hers, grinning at her when she let out a disappointed moan.

"A bit possessive today, are we Kens?" he asked.

She knew exactly what he was referring to but chose to ignore him, leaning in for another kiss. He denied her and instead reached up to cup her cheek in his palm, caressing the loose hairs at her temple and holding her head in place.

"Protective maybe," she offered, tilting her head and smiling. "You know I'm always here to watch your ass."

Deeks chuckled at her choice of words and hummed in gratitude when her hands reached around to give his bum an affirming squeeze. "How's your lip?" he asked, his thumb passing gently over the small cut on her mouth.

"I think I'll live," she responded shortly, again trying to initiate a kiss.

This time Deeks obliged, but only for a moment before he asked, "So what _actually_ happened with you and, uh… Agent Del Campo today?"

"You mean Talia? Oh, she's awesome," Kensi answered enthusiastically. "The DEA has an indoor long distance rifle range at their facility in Culver City, we're going shooting on Saturday."

"It's been like… three hours. How did you set that up already?" Deeks asked, incredulous.

"We chatted while you were out picking up booze for the depth charges," she answered simply, fidgeting with the cloth of his shirt. "Turns out we have a lot in common."

"Do you, now?," Deeks answered skeptically.

"Uh-huh," she continued as she ran her fingers lightly up to his chest. "We're both pretty bad-ass, we both don't take any shit, and we both have an affinity for guns."

In truth, Kensi had most definitely not been an immediate fan of Talia's. If forced to testify, she might go so far as to say she had initially despised the flirtatious federal agent. Deeks' inability to maintain his composure at their introduction did not help matters. Kensi was however, a little pleased with how easily she was able to completely stupefy her partner that morning in the boat shed, simply by letting her hair down and undoing a button on her shirt.

Talia had of course joined the cleavage competition. But none of that was what had really bothered Kensi. She wasn't afraid of Talia or anyone else ' _poaching her boyfriend_.' She was upset that Deeks wasn't hers to steal. Kensi did not care to admit to Talia again that he was simply her partner; or even to put the smug bitch in her place by informing her that she got her 'engine oil changed' plenty, thank you very much. Kensi may have instead gone a little overboard. A lot overboard… She head butted her. In the face.

Kensi was embarrassed she had reacted so easily. But she was inclined to instead blame it all on the ambivalent beach boy who's hands were now at her rib cage, just barely caressing the sides of her covered breasts.

"But there's something I have that she doesn't," she whispered into his ear.

"What's that?" Deeks asked as he ghosted a kiss across the cut on her lip.

Kensi answered by leaning into their kiss with renewed urgency. One hand groped obviously at his crotch, while the other bunched in his shirt in an attempt to free it from his body. Deeks helped her with her task, but found it difficult to do the same for her; she had unbuckled his belt and was pushing his jeans and boxers down his thighs, allowing his erection to spring up.

"Like I said," he said in a deep voice amidst kisses. "Possessive."

Kensi didn't deny it. But she did push off against the wall, forcing him to step back from her. Quelling any further comments from him, she coupled her lips and tongue with his.

With great difficulty, Deeks managed to guide Kensi back to his bedroom while his pants were around his calves. Kicking them free, he fell back onto his bed while Kensi shed the rest of her clothes with absolutely no fanfare. Deeks took in the sight of her lithe form briefly before she knocked aside the hands he was offering to her and instead pinned his shoulders down on his mattress.

Their lips collided in demanding kisses. Kensi whimpered but ignored the slight pain where the fragile skin was damaged. She had climbed onto his lap, straddling his thighs, and Deeks snaked a hand between her legs to rub at her clit.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" he asked in a harsh whisper upon discovering just how wet she already was. "Is it the rum? 'Cause I haven't even touched you yet!"

"Mhhhmh," was all Kensi managed as a reply, her lips otherwise engaged with the flushed skin at the base of his neck. Breaking free, she shifted up his body a few inches and reached down to stroke his stiff as steel erection. "I've been ready for this all day."

Deeks grasped at her ass with both hands as she positioned the head of his cock right at her entrance. Kensi panted and Deeks moaned as she pressed her chest into his and lowered herself onto him slowly. She was still noticeably tighter from having rushed past their usual foreplay, and she reveled in the sensation of her walls stretching as he filled her inch by inch. She rolled her hips back and forth, gently biting his shoulder as she urged him deeper with each movement.

He had been sheathed within her for barely a minute, had only just sunk in all the way, and hadn't really started moving yet when the sweet burn she was feeling escalated into a surprise explosion of pleasure. She cried out at the strength of it.

"Oh my god, Kens," Deeks growled from beneath her. "You weren't messing around!"

"Told you I was ready," she panted into his ear.

Kensi continued to rock back and forth gently against Deeks. But she had no inclination to move much more than that as she came back down from her unexpected high. He enveloped her in his arms and pulled her into his chest as he sat up. Kensi intensified his more gentle kisses and wrapped her legs behind his back as she sat in his lap.

Pushing off against his shoulders, Kensi lay back down towards the foot of his bed. Deeks had to pull out of her momentarily to reposition himself between her legs. But before he pressed his hips to hers again, he took a moment to bend down and run his tongue against her swollen bundle of nerves; sensitive and flush with color from her recent release. Kensi cried out loudly and bucked her hips against his face, reeling at the intensity with which she felt each caress from his tongue.

After a few moments more, he slid back up her body, licking and sucking at random patches of skin on her abdomen. He paid special attention to her breasts before finally returning his mouth to hers. Deeks hovered above her and waited for her eyes to open and meet his again before plunging his cock back into her wetness.

Kensi gripped at his biceps, bulging with the exertion of holding himself up above her. She no longer even tried to suppress the cries and whimpers she let out each time he thrust deep within her. Deeks wasn't even moving that fast, but he was pushing hard and she could feel herself rapidly approaching another peak. Kensi reached up and pulled his head down, bringing his lips to hers before coming again with a gasp into his mouth.

"Fuck, Kens!" Deeks called out from the brink. Her inner muscles were hot, and convulsing so rapidly around his cock that Deeks finally let go, shaking with the force of his orgasm. He shifted over just enough so that when he collapsed, he didn't completely crush her.

Kensi stretched out beneath him, digging her feet into the pillows at the head of the bed.

"Wow," she breathed out, her chest rising and falling quickly against the arm Deeks had draped over her.

"Yeah," he said into her hair. "So was it the rum?"

"Huh?"

"That got you so wound up like this?" he clarified.

"Deeks, we've gotten a little buzzed and then had sex more than once before," Kensi pointed out to him.

"Beer, and maybe whiskey. But not rum," he wondered out loud. "The alternative is that you were—"

"Don't say it," she cut him off.

"Say what?" Deeks asked, turning his head so he could shoot her a smug grin.

" _Jealous_ ," Kensi answered flatly.

"I was going to say 'territorial,'" he offered. "Not that you needed to be."

"Or," she countered, "it has more to do with spending a couple of hours convinced my teammates were going to die in a submarine."

"It all turned out okay," he said quietly. "It always does."

' _Until it doesn't_ ,' she added silently to herself. From his silence, quiet breaths, and stilled movements, Kensi assumed his train of thought ran parallel to hers.

After a few minutes more, Deeks began to gently rub his hand up and down her side and inhaled deeply as he peppered soft kisses up her neck and at the corner of her jaw. He shifted slightly and she could feel him pressed against her hip, already hard again.

"So soon?" she asked, grinning into his sloppy kisses.

He lifted his head to smile at her and brushed the hairs plastered against her skin away from her face. In a low, gravelly voice he told her, "You weren't the only one who was ready for this all day."

* * *

Some time after midnight, when the room had finally stilled and their bodies cooled, Kensi found herself again feeling uneasy. As satisfying as those couple of bouts were, and as much as she lo— deeply _cared_ for Deeks, she was starting to get restless with this waiting game. She decided she'd much rather not lay in his arms; waiting for him to finally show his hand and let her in, but instead hearing only gentle snores. So to punish him for being so stubborn and to punish herself for her lack of self-control, she rolled out of bed and quickly located her scattered clothing.

She was surprised when he didn't try to stop her from leaving, but then noticed that he had already fallen asleep. His arm was draped across her side of— or rather, the other side of _his_ bed. He reached out restlessly in his slumber but encountered only empty sheets. She thought she saw the faintest flicker of a frown on his otherwise sated face.

She pulled the sheet up over his bare shoulders and resisted the temptation to kiss his cheek. With a last wistful glance at his peaceful features, she headed for the door and for her own vacant bed.

* * *

 **A/N: Thank again for the reviews, follows and favs. I'm a good way into the next chapter and should have it out shortly.**


	8. The Flop

**(Chapter 8: The Flop)**

 **A/N: Takes place just before 6x02 ("Inelegant Heart"). I was originally going to skip this episode, but then I ended up watching it again recently and decided that their rapport was so good that we had to have some more happy times between the last run of drama and the next.**

 **Rating: How have you gotten this far and not realized what I'm writing about? It's rated M.**

* * *

Pale golden light crept through a narrow gap in the curtains and fell right across the closed eyes of Marty Deeks. He was unsure of what had woken him, and thought at first it might have been his dog. Remembering that Monty was kenneled because he had to work late last night, he tried to fall asleep again, but to no avail. He took his first deep breath of the morning, and felt his chest press against the back of the mysterious woman sleeping in his arms.

He knew who she was of course; she was Kensi Blye, his gorgeous partner of the last four-ish years. What remained a mystery to him though, was what was really going on in her head; how she was so good at steeling her emotions; and most importantly, why she put up with him at all, much less welcomed him into her bed.

His bleary eyes caught sight of the clock on her cluttered night stand. The numbers just visible above her Sig informed him that her alarm would go off in only five minutes.

As he lay there, willing those five minutes to turn into hours, he revisited the pleasant dream he had awoken from. It hadn't been too different from his current reality; Kensi had been there, neither of them had been dressed, there may have been a dancing llama somewhere, and that was a little weird... but a good dream none the less.

Four minutes. Deeks resisted the urge to pull his arms tighter around her. She was still sleeping. They had gotten in late from a stake out in a long term case, and had only gotten as far as undressing before both had fallen asleep.

It didn't bother him even a little bit that they hadn't had sex last night. In fact, over the past few weeks, they'd spent almost half of their nights crashing at each other's homes and in each other's beds. They were _intimate_ plenty of those times. But once they had started literally _sleeping_ with each other too, Kensi had settled down quite a bit. She seemed a little happier, a lot less plaintive around him, and she no longer bolted in the dead of night. Granted, that was also harder to do when they stayed in _her_ bed as they just had.

Deeks knew though that she was getting restless with him and he couldn't blame her. What was he waiting for? Why couldn't he just lay it all on the table and tell he how much he loved her _and_ how much that scared him? At this point even he barely knew.

Three minutes. He was no longer truly afraid she would run from him if he told her some of his darker secrets. He wasn't even sure he intended to tell her anymore. He was starting to believe he could make this work without ever revealing the skeletons in his closet. But she deserved better. She needed him to be honest, consistent; to not flop back and forth on his intentions, to be up front and deliberate. He was certain she didn't need his issues to deal with on top of her own.

Two minutes to go. These past few weeks had let them get back to the basics of their partnership. The senior partners were both gone; assigned to a deep cover mission that stuck Callen behind bars twenty-four hours a day and Sam covering him as a prison guard. The junior partners were left to hold down the fort, to train, and to follow up on some less pressing cases.

Without the four inquisitive eyes that were on them most often however, some of their time at work together had gotten a little... charged. More than once Kensi had to admonish him for shooting her a heated look from across the quiet bull-pen, or for keeping her in a hold a little longer than was necessary when they trained. And she had pointed out to him that trying to convince her to 'adjust his posture' in the shooting range was a new all-time low.

One minute until the alarm was set to go off. As much as he would rather fall back asleep, he smiled when it occurred to him that he would see her gorgeous mismatched eyes in a few moments. Even if they would be a little grumpy until she got some caffeine in her.

As he tried to guess how many seconds of peace he had left, he wondered idly if he should have roused her when he woke up. If he should have pressed his luck and tried for a little morning romp. He regretted such thoughts instantly when they inspired his mostly dormant manhood to puff up hopefully. His second brain always was lousy at telling when it was shit outta luck.

As prepared for the alarm as he was, it still startled and agitated him; more so when Kensi barely reacted at all. She inhaled deeply and arched into him, stretching the muscles of her long body. It was Deeks who had to reach across her to quiet the shrill noise, practically rolling on top of her to do so.

Kensi had buried her face in her pillow and garbled what might have been 'morning partner,' or could just as easily have been 'fucking alarm."

"Morning sunshine," he whispered cheerfully into her hair.

His reward was more noises from Kensi that sounded like a direction for Deeks to do something to himself that was anatomically impossible. Deeks only smiled and pet her shoulder, chuckling softly at his grouchy night owl.

With sudden resolve, Kensi rolled over and threw back the covers.

"Nooooo," Deeks whined. "So cold. Where are you going?"

"To take a shower. Come on Deeks! It's time to get up," she informed him.

Throwing an arm over her waist, Deeks responded, "Or, we could not."

"Not go into work? Right," she answered sarcastically.

"We'd go. Eventually," he added. Then in a low voice suggested, "Just not right away. We could stay here. In this bed. Get a little pre-work… _stretching_ in."

Kensi snorted at him, more fully awake. "Unlikely. You want the wonder twins locating our phones when we don't show up on time?" she asked, failing to resist his embrace even a little bit. "Or worse, Hetty appearing out of thin air to see where we are?"

"That would be bad," he conceded. "But, we have over an hour before we have to be there. There's time."

"Time for you, maybe," Kensi chided him. Narrowing her eyes and smirking at him, she started, "Or—"

"Or?" he asked hopefully.

"—Or… we skip the shower, wear our workout clothes in, and move our training to the beginning of the day so we can shower right after. We have nothing else that needs to be done before lunch."

"I like the way you think, Agent Blye. But what would we do with the extra time before work?" he wondered seductively.

"We could… clean my apartment?" Kensi offered.

"Ha!" Deeks barked in laughter. "We have a hour, not a month."

"Then I guess we can pick up where we left off last night?" she suggested.

"You mean when you started drooling on my shoulder?" he asked her playfully, shifting so their torsos were pressed more firmly together.

"Like this?" Kensi leaned into him and licked her slobbery tongue from the bulge of his deltoids all the way up to the stubble on his neck.

Deeks grimaced in mock disgust and tried to pull away from her. But she lunged after him and climbed entirely on top of his body. She bent down to kiss him, but Deeks indulged her for only a few moments before rolling her easily to her back. He ran his hands down the smooth sides of her curves before fidgeting with the skin at her hips where her underwear should have been.

Remembering that they had in fact managed to remove all of their clothing in their exhausted state last night, Deeks told her, "This really is much easier when we sleep naked. No panties to remove. Maybe we should never wear clothes."

"To… bed?" she clarified, giving him a playful grin as he shifted down her body.

The mischievous smile he returned let her know that he would, in fact, prefer to never be clothed in her presence. His busy lips had made it as far as her naval before Kensi seized him by his disheveled hair and pulled his face back to hers.

"No time!" she explained through hasty kisses.

Deeks would not be completely deterred from his task. He took two of his fingers in his mouth and coated them in saliva before plunging them between her legs. Kensi quivered in surprise at his boldness, and tugged at his hair a little harder.

Satisfied with the moisture within her folds, Deeks released her and allowed Kensi to roll them over a third time, nearly toppling off the edge of her bed.

"See, I kinda miss you wearing boxers to bed," she told him as her hand explored his hard body below her, tracing the lines of his muscles. She found what she had been grasping for, and discovered that his partial had inflated to a fully grown erection. She planted another kiss on his open lips before elaborating, "Freeing you from your pants is one of my favorite parts. It's like unwrapping a Twinkie."

"A Twinkie?!" he cried indignantly. "Come on! You can come up with a more manly comparison than that. And if we're going with junk food snack cakes, at least pick Ding-Dong or something."

"But you know how much I love Twinkies," she said sweetly, pouting at him.

Deeks simply snorted out an indignant laugh. As punishment for her words he took his own dick out of her hand, and away from where she was guiding him. She dug her fingers into his shoulders and attempted to grind her hips against him in response.

Teasing her clit with the head of his cock he whispered, "And if that's your favorite part, then I'm clearly not doing enough for you."

" _One_ of my favorite parts," she corrected him impatiently through breathy gasps, trying to create friction against him with her gyrating hips. As she was finally able to sink down on him a few inches she added through a moan, "and _this_ is another."

Deeks couldn't deny her any longer even if he had wanted to. He allowed her take control completely, and let his hands slide down to hold on to her butt as she rode him. She was bracing herself with her palms on his shoulders, and he bent forward to nudge her flowing hair aside with his face, revealing her breasts to him as they swayed with her motions.

As her hip thrusts on top of him became more erratic, he switched the pace up and slammed up into her as deep as he could several times; pausing a few moments in her depths to feel her clench tightly around him, and feel her ass against his thighs and balls.

Kensi leaned further back to really feel him against the most aching spot within her as she rode him hard. Deeks kept one hand on her waist to hold her steady, while the other moved to just above where they were joined to help her along. He rubbed her clit vigorously with his thumb until he could feel her muscles begin to tremble. Finally toppling over the edge, Kensi slumped forward onto his chest.

Deeks had been holding on as long as he could, and when he heard Kensi call his name as she came, he finally let his own waves of pleasure crash over him, and thrust into her several more times until he had finished his release.

"Kens?" he whispered sweetly to his sated partner when her face moved to hover above his.

"Deeks?" she answered, dotting soft kisses along his jaw.

"Was that your _most_ favorite part?" he said with a lopsided grin.

The twinkle in her contrasting eyes and the way Kensi bit her lip as she smiled at him, sent a jolt through his heart when she replied, "Every time. At least since I've been with you."

Deeks continued to catch his breath in bed while he considered all of the wonderful meanings behind her words. Kensi had already moved on to getting ready. She rolled off of him and went to clean up a bit then retrieve a clean pair of underwear (surprisingly put away) in her dresser. After putting them on, she plopped down on the sheets next to where she had left him.

"You're going to be a slacker in our workout today, aren't you?" she asked, poking none too gently at his heaving chest.

"I'll have you know— and by now you really _should_ know," he said dramatically, "that I have the stamina of a race horse!"

"Race horses are sprinters, Deeks," Kensi corrected him, rising again to locate more clean clothes stashed in odd places around her room.

"A long distance race horse..?" Deeks wondered aloud, sitting up and fluffing his hair with one hand. "Sled dog! I've got the stamina of a sled dog… running the Iditarod across America's icy frontier!"

"More of a shaggy mutt than a majestic malamute, don't you think?" she teased.

"How dare you!" Deeks shouted in mock offense, standing up to drive home his point. "I challenge you to a duel! I'm dropping the gauntlet to defend my honor, and the honor of shaggy dogs everywhere!"

"Calm down, Balto," she chided. "A duel might not be practical. But I can take you down in the sparring ring!"

"Wanna bet?" Deeks asked as he pulled his sweat pants on, taking a last look at Kensi's shirtless torso before she slipped on a top. "Loser buys dinner tonight?"

She smiled at him mischievously and stepped into his space to look him in the eyes. "You're on."

They dressed in athletic wear and packed a set of clean clothes to change into before grabbing a snack from Kensi's abysmal selection in her kitchen.

"Granola bars again?" he exclaimed. "Whatever happened to that smoothie kick you were on? I need my energy if I'm gonna whoop your ass!"

"Excuses already, Deeks?" Kensi replied, waiting for him at her front door. "Why don't you just fold now? At least you'll be able to pick what you want to eat when you're buying me dinner tonight!"

Deeks only smiled as he joined her in the foyer. He knew he would likely have no say in their dinner venue that evening, regardless of who won their little sparring match. As he approached her, he suppressed the urge to kiss her once more before they headed out the door. Not for the first time either, but he was fairly certain that such an affectionate act outside of the bedroom was not part of their current arrangement.

He hiked his bag up and over his shoulder, chuckling at her as he said, "You just wait. You don't even know what tricks I've got hidden up my sleeve."

"Double or nothing I make you tap out and leaving you flopping on the mat like a fish!" she called back to him, half way out the door.

Deeks laughed in earnest and stepped outside after her. "Bring it on, Princess!"

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 **A/N: Thanks again for sticking with this. Your kind words have really meant a lot to this amateur author of obscenities.**


	9. Raise, Call or Fold

**(Chapter 9: Raise, Call or Fold)**

 **A/N: It's become apparent to me that I believe any and all difficult conversations between Kensi and Deeks should be had while they're naked. And preferably acting on their nakedness.**

 **Tagged to 6x03 ("Praesidium"); These two tortured souls continue to try and find solace in each other.**

 **Rating: This chapter is only rated T… Just kidding. It's totally M rated. Gotcha, didn't I?**

* * *

" _I just wanna forget what happened_ ," she had told him that morning in the boat shed.

" _Shh, shh_ ," he sighed, pulling her in for a hug. Holding her tight, he had told her, " _I know you do. I know you do, but you can't. And the harder you try, the harder it's just going to fight back. Trust me. You just gotta let it out. You gotta make peace with it. And that takes time_."

Kensi sat at the small table in her apartment, rubbing absently at a spot on the glass of barely sipped whiskey. It had been too shitty a day to even bother with drinking. Hetty was in danger, Mattias Draeger was back in town, the Department of Justice had clowns all over them for what happened _to her_ in Afghanistan, and Deeks…

" _Come on, partners don't keep secrets,_ " he had told her. " _I mean, that's what we are, right? We're partners._ " It was true that 'partners' was the only word she was actually sure about using to define them. But given everything they'd been through, everything they'd done in the last sixteen months, Kensi was sure there had to be a better word. Maybe one of those eight syllable german ones that meant a whole sentence in english? And Deeks had basically, if not really seriously, suggested that she move in with with him. Who asks that of someone who's just their partner? Even a partner they're sleeping with?

"Kens?" Deeks asked quietly, drawing her focus back to the present. He sat across from her beside an equally untouched drink, fidgeting with a pile of weeks old beer bottle caps.

"It's been a long day," she admitted.

"Started at six in the morning," Deeks complained before adding, "We are never both sleeping on that couch again, by the way. I don't care if there's an all night marathon of James Bond movies on or not."

She smiled at him, but ignored his comment. "And if Draeger is back in town, tomorrow is going to be even longer."

"That guy," Deeks said with frustration. "Coming after Hetty again? Some guys just don't know when to fold, cut their losses, and walk away."

"And others don't know when they should be bold, and raise the stakes," she added, looking at his exhausted features.

He considered her, probably wondering what her remarks referred to specifically, but didn't say anything further. His blue eyes dropped to the amber liquid in his glass, and his face remained unreadable.

Kensi's thoughts still lingered with the day's events. On having to recount again to Inspector Wallace exactly what she had been through at the hands of the Taliban. How they had hurt her when they thought she was CIA. How abandoned she had felt when she found out it was a all because of a stupid game America's intelligence agencies were playing with each other.

Her mind shifted back to Deeks, to over a year ago when she told him that she knew how he felt after having been tortured. How wrong she was. " _I really hope you never do,_ " he had said to her then bluntly, barely holding back tears.

"Sometimes I forget," she stated quietly, yet abruptly.

"About?"

"What happened to you," she said. Neither really needed her to elaborate, but she added, "What you went through last year. It slips my mind some times."

"Lucky you," he said dryly.

"I know. And I'm sorry—" she started to say genuinely.

Not letting her finish Deeks replied, "Don't be. It's my burden to bear, not yours."

"You've been helping me with mine," she reminded him.

"And you help me daily, whether or not you know it," he said, meeting her eyes. "I could have never come back to work if it weren't for you."

She returned his gaze for a few moments. Kensi then picked up her glass and tossed it back, finishing the smooth yet harsh liquid in one gulp. "I'm going to bed," she announced, setting the glass back down.

"Okay. Do you want me to stay?" he asked quietly.

Of course she did. Her nightmares were getting less frequent and she had been falling asleep much quicker since they had made a habit of sharing a bed. Remembering how he struggled with sleep for weeks after his trauma, and how she had stayed with him for a time then, she smiled at him warmly. ' _Maybe we're both just broken_ ,' she thought to herself. ' _And we're only whole when we're together_.'

Lacking the nerves to say something so bold and so clichéd, she instead answered aloud, "Yeah. If you want."

"Ok," he affirmed. Smiling slightly.

Deeks had brought Monty with him, and took him out once more before returning and locking the door behind them. Kensi had put away her whiskey (but not her glasses), and had already made her way to her bathroom to brush her teeth.

Their sleepover routine was decently well rehearsed by now. And after fifteen minutes, the pair had settled into bed and turned the lights off.

"Good night, Deeks," she told him.

"Good night, partner," he replied.

There was that word again. She would never admit it, but in that moment she almost preferred when he called her princess.

They started so far apart from each other in her bed. They usually did on nights when they hadn't fallen into bed in a bout of passion. Deeks was on his belly with his arms tucked under his pillow, his head turned away from her. No matter how they started, they usually woke up tangled in each others arms some how. Kensi just didn't want to wait for them to move together in their sleep tonight.

Shifting closer to him, she ran a hand over the soft fabric of the shirt on his back. He turned his head to her, and rolled to his side to give her a place to snuggle in. She gladly moved into his embrace, and tucked her head into his shoulder.

An hour had passed and she still couldn't find sleep. Her mind was preparing for the coming day; running through too many scenarios for their eventual encounter with Draeger and his men, and occasionally bouncing back to relevant memories from past incidents. They had shifted several times over, but still managed to remain touching somewhere on their bodies; an arm draped over a waist, a leg tucked under another, butts pressed together when they were back to back.

Kensi was beginning to suspect that Deeks wasn't asleep yet either; his breathing was quiet, yet shallow. They had rolled and were facing each other. Kensi could see through the darkness that his eyes were also open.

"Can't sleep?" he asked her quietly.

She nodded in response. Kensi wanted to reach out and push the hair from his face. She wanted to kiss him softly, and sweetly. She wanted to hold him tight against her for the rest of the night. But it all seemed too intimate. Too serious. Against the last unspoken conditions of their casual arrangement. So she did the next best thing: she made up an excuse.

"Can you just… I still feel so… tense," she told him. It was lame; she knew it, and she didn't care. She shifted closer to him and placed a hand on his shoulder, allowing for his palm to settle at her waist.

Deeks nodded and pressed his hand into her hips and moved his face closer to hers. He nuzzled her nose with his once before capturing her lips in a slow, soft kiss. He rolled her slightly so she was on her back, and pressed a knee into the mattress between her legs. Kensi sighed faintly into his embrace. He was giving her exactly what she wanted without having been told.

For several minutes they kissed. Occasionally separating their lips to softly suck at a neck, or caress a cheek. All the while, Kensi's need for gentle comfort was growing in to a more heated desire. And if the growing bulge pushing against her hips was any indication, Deeks was feeling much the same.

His hands were still at her waist. Though they had meandered their way below her tank top to stroke at the soft skin below. Kensi's hands had likewise reached to feel beneath his shirt at the hard muscles of his back. She moved to pull the shirt up over his head, and when their lips met again it was with renewed intensity, though no less passion.

Kensi felt Deeks' hot breath on her neck when he finally broke free to speed up the process of removing their clothes. Divested of their sleep wear but still below the sheets, he settled back on top of her again.

Deeks' body was hot and solid against hers, and Kensi didn't care that she wasn't fully ready when she reached between them to guide his hard cock to her entrance. She rubbed him back and forth a few times until he could squeeze into the right spot. Kensi braced herself and gently bit his shoulder as he pushed into her slowly, so slowly. But beyond the tight outer seal, she was more than wet and primed for him.

She returned her lips to his as he began to rock back and forth above her, undulating his entire torso with each of his deliberate strokes. Their pace was slow; languid. Their arms wrapped around each other, their chests pressed together and their legs intertwined. They were literally touching each other as much as they possibly could, and holding on as if they never wanted to let go.

After several minutes of this torturously slow pace, Kensi shifted downward slightly so the base of Deeks' shaft rubbed against her clit as he moved. And all of the sudden she was there, crying out in the otherwise subdued bedroom as the slow burn turned into an explosive fire.

"God, Kensi! You're so beautiful," Deeks told her before kissing her soundly again.

"Deeks!" she cried softly. Her only other response was to cling to him as tightly as she could, as he continued to move steadily inside her. When she had regained control of her breathing, she returned to attempting to devour his face.

Deeks' breath had become more ragged. He shifted to his elbows and held himself up as his pace increased; restraint clearly visible on his face.

"Deeks!" she called to him again. "Let go."

"Kens— Oh, Kensi!" is all he could manage when he finally found his release inside of her, his cock pulsating in time with his racing heart. Her orgasm had also not yet subsided, and she continued to twitch around him.

He rolled them so she rested on his chest. They were completely tangled in her sheets, and were almost uncomfortably hot. But neither had any inclination to separate from the other.

Only vaguely aware that Deeks also seemed to be drifting peacefully to sleep, Kensi's mind was finally at rest. She wasn't thinking about the day that had passed, or the day to come. The last thought to occur to her was that they hadn't just had sex; they had made love. In retrospect, not for the first time. She thought that maybe she should be more concerned about that. But she couldn't bring herself to care before sleep finally won her over.

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 **A/N: I actually ran through three very different outlines for this particular chapter, some of which took place before the beginning of the episode it's tagged to. But you would be surprised at how hard it is to get people back into their clothes and asleep on the couch after what I originally had in mind.**


	10. The Turn

**(Chapter 10: The Turn)**

 **A/N: Set the next evening (presumably), and after 6x04 ("The Third Choir").**

 **To me, this episode provided the most proof (in the form of dialogue) that these two were getting down and dirty off screen. Seriously. Go back and watch it. And while I think I've established pretty well what exactly I think they'd gotten up to, a chapter tagged to this episode seemed necessary to pay homage to this theory.**

 **Rating: {{witty_comment_about_rating_still_being_M}}**

* * *

"Also, way to have _zero_ chill this morning," Deeks chastised his partner as they walked through the front door of his apartment.

"What are you talking about now?" Kensi responded, exasperated at her shaggy haired companion's incessant babbling. She ditched her work bag on his couch, and headed straight for Deeks' kitchen to rummage around in his fridge.

Deeks had joined her in the kitchen and was leaning back against his counter cockily. " _'We, uh, carpooled… he wears underwear, I think… We're just partners,'"_ he mimicked her in an unflatteringly high voice, repeating her words from that morning at work.

"I sound nothing like that," she responded in an aggrieved tone, slamming the fridge shut having not found anything worth pilfering.

Deeks chuckled at her lightly and countered, "It was a flawless impersonation, and _you_ are going to get us caught."

"Me?" she questioned, incredulously.

"How are you so impossibly bad at this?" he replied, smiling broadly and laughing at her "We work undercover for a living!"

"You weren't so suave yourself, _Magic Marty_ ," she countered.

"Exactly that! You distracted me by talking about strippers… again!" he accused.

Shaking her head at him, she stepped into his space and prodded at his chest. "At least I'm not the one who then told the assistant director of NCIS about my underwear."

"No, you just elaborated on _my_ undergarment habits," he responded indignantly. Flicking the errant strands of hair from his brow, he continued, "And tripped all over yourself when you tried to backpedal."

"Whatever," she conceded. "I didn't see you keeping your cool around Granger."

"I did too!" he argued.

"What? No! When?" she cried, skeptically.

"Later," Deeks elaborated through a lopsided grin, shrugging as he did so. "When he asked us in the boat shed if we had anything better to do. I lied and shook my head." The bickering partners had moved to within inches of each other. Both with salacious grins on their faces.

"Ha! And what were you _going_ to say?" she inquired, cocking her head to the side.

Wasting no time, Deeks responded, "I was going to _do…_ this."

He reached for her hips and pulled her to him, his butt still pressed into the edge of the countertop. He guided her hips into his, and Kensi's hands went automatically to cup his face and bring his lips to hers.

Her breath mingled with his for a moment before it caught in her lungs. The feeling of his body conforming to hers, his hands on her hips, his scruff against her palms, and his tongue in her mouth made her insides flutter.

She pulled away from him and ran her hands down his chest, massaging at the hard muscles beneath his shirt. His lips were flush with color from her kiss, and he pulled them back over his teeth in a cocky grin.

"Is that all you were going to do?" she asked him in a low voice.

"Well, I think that would have gotten the point across, and _for sure_ given the game away," he replied, reaching again for her lips with his.

"You wouldn't want to do something _more_? Something to uh… _nail_ it home?" she said, unable to contain her gleeful chortle.

"That was bad. Terrible really. You should feel ashamed of that one," Deeks said though his own attempt to stifle laughter.

"And yet," she responded, hooking her long fingers under the waistband of his jeans and smiling when his nostrils flared at her touch, "It felt so _good_."

She knelt in front of him and fiddled with the buckle and button on the front of his pants. Deeks braced his hands on the edge of the counter when she freed his cock from his jeans and boxers.

"Good. Yeah, no," he stumbled though his words, his breath stuck in his lungs. "So good."

"So you _did_ remember to put underwear on," she remarked at his boxers, smiling at the stupefying effect she had on him.

"Ha," he laughed sharply between breaths. "You were there when I put them on."

She grinned and tugged at him a few times, feeling him stiffen noticeably in her hand. Holding his dick up against his own stomach, Kensi teased the underside of his length from his base to the head with just the tip of her tongue. Deeks whined and reached out after her in dismay when she then abruptly rose and walked away from him. His momentary disappointment subsided when he saw she had retrieved the soft kitchen mat near his sink. With appropriate padding for her knees, Kensi returned to her task.

Using only her mouth to stroke and pull on him, she placed her hands on his hips, and slowly dragged them down his thighs, pushing his pants further down as she went. Deeks groaned through a heavy gulp and visibly restrained himself from thrusting forward as Kensi took him deeper.

Her hands ran back up his bare legs and pushed under his shirt, massaging at the tight muscles of his abdomen. Deeks took the hint and pulled his shirt off over his head, tossing it waywardly in the direction of his living room. She brought her hands back down to grasp his length and released him from her mouth. Breathing freely and looking up at Deeks' appreciative face, she swirled her tongue around the tip of his cock.

Deeks reached down for her elbows and hauled her back to her feet. He pulled her to him and covered her lips hungrily with his before slipping his hands beneath her butt and picking her up. Kensi clung to his waist with her thighs and held on to his shoulders as he pivoted them around and set her down on the counter; reversing their positions.

She was biting her lip and leaning forward as she gazed at Deeks with anticipation. He struggled with her belt buckle because he couldn't tear his transfixed eyes away from hers to see what his hands were doing. Finally he managed to get it undone, and Kensi lifted herself off of the counter to help him remove her pants and underwear completely.

"Tsss! Cold!" she exclaimed when her bare ass hit the granite.

"Move to the bedroom?" Deeks asked, as his warm hands caressed her thighs and butt.

"No, no!" she replied quickly, wrapping her arms around his shoulders to keep him in place. In truth, Kensi felt that they needed a quick fuck in a less intimate setting. Last night had been passionate and sweet; and exactly what she wanted at the time. But it had also reminded her of the longing she felt for her partner to be more than a lover; more than something casual… or whatever they were.

She added, "Right here. Now."

"Here in my kitchen?" he whispered huskily against her ear, nipping at her lobe. "In my _clean_ kitchen?"

"My bare ass is already on your counter," she reminded him, reaching down to stroke at his erection impatiently. "So we may as well."

Unable to argue with that logic, Deeks leaned forward and groaned into another kiss. Steadying himself on his elbows, he dropped his mouth to her covered breasts, peppering kisses on her neck and chest along the way.

Kensi arched into his touch, shifting her weight off of her hands so she could remove her shirt. Deeks assisted her with her efforts, then immediately reached around to the clasp of her bra. Once the straps of her bra hung loose, she allowed him to pull it off of her and toss it away with the rest of their discarded clothing.

Deeks stood back; both to admire her naked form, and to step out of and kick aside his pants that were still bunched around his ankles. Kensi watched his gaze drift over her body hungrily, and shifted her weight to one arm so she could run the fingers on her free hand through his hair as he knelt before her.

He snaked each arm beneath both of her legs, forcing Kensi to lean back on her elbows as he propped her thighs up on his shoulders. He kissed along the inside of her left leg, inching closer and closer to her center. But he passed her over, just barely tickling the sensitive skin with his lips and his scruff. He repeated the process on her right leg, smirking against her skin as Kensi sighed with frustration. Then finally, blissfully, he made contact.

His tongue delved between her folds, dancing over her already worked up bundle of nerves. Kensi whimpered at the intense feeling, and dug her heels into his back. Deeks strained to hold her legs down as she squirmed against his insatiable ministrations.

For a few blissful minutes, Deeks made use of his entire tongue to explore the moist, pink flesh between Kensi's legs. The heat she felt at his touch had started as a soft hum, but had built in a crescendo to a full blown cacophony. Deeks had slipped a single finger inside her just as her climax crashed over her. Curling it rhythmically inside her, he helped draw out the sensations she was feeling for almost a minute.

When she had finally settled, Deeks rose and stood up properly between her legs. Still very sensitive, Kensi winced when he rubbed the head of his rock hard erection against her throbbing clit.

Deeks leaned forward to kiss her languidly, resting his weight on his free hand. His lips still occupied with hers, he nestled his cock in the right place, and pushed inside of her slowly.

"Fuck, Kens!" he moaned into her mouth as he slid in to the hilt.

Kensi only moaned in response, her eyes shut tight at the feeling of being filled completely. She opened them again to find that Deeks' blue eyes, darkened with desire, were boring straight into hers.

He began to move with long strokes. Kensi was in such a position that she was able to do little to match his movements beyond wrapping her legs encouragingly around his waist. She simultaneously disliked not being in control, yet loved the anticipation and the surprise bursts of pleasure brought by each of his movements.

Deeks pulled back from her slightly and shifted her body as close to the edge of the counter as she could be without falling off. With more room to work, he began to slam into her with speed. Restraint showed on his face, and Kensi bit her own lip, unable to lean forward enough to reach his.

She began to shift her weight to one arm so she could put her other hand to use, but Deeks beat her to it. With one hand he held her thigh steady as he pounded into her, the other he moved between them. Digging his fingers into her inner thigh, he rubbed his thumb at her clit in time with each of his hurried strokes. With his additional attentions, it wasn't long before Kensi threw her head back in ecstasy, causing a loud thud as it collided with the cabinet behind her.

"Kens?" Deeks managed through his strained breaths.

"Don't stop!" she cried to him before his movements could slow.

The powerful fluttering of her inner muscles masked both the pain in her head and the sensations of his own release deep within her. But it was obvious that Deeks had come when he growled her name and leaned forward to gently bite at the base of her neck.

Kensi brought her hands up to wrap around his shoulders as she came down from her high, and Deeks did the same with her waist. Still coupled, they held each other close for a minute or two, their foreheads leaned together while their breathing slowed. Soon though, Kensi was reminded of the cool polished stone against her heated skin, and gently pushed at his hips until he pulled back enough to let them separate.

Stretching her slightly achy muscles as she stood, Kensi reached up to fidget with her hair. Deeks took one last chance to run his hand up the side of her torso to her still bare breasts, earning a shiver from her and a smile in response.

"I'm going to go take a shower," she informed him, running her fingers along the breadth of his chest.

"Hold on! I need to clean up the kitchen," Deeks said, stepping away to slide the floor mat back in place, and seeking out his stash of cleaning supplies beneath the sink.

"Come on, Deeks!" Kensi called from the hallway, smiling back at him before disappearing into the bathroom. "Don't you have anything better to do?"

Settling on a tube of disinfecting wipes, Deeks rapidly wiped down the counter where they had been. Hastily throwing the wipe at the trash and missing, he followed after her and answered, "I do. I really do."

* * *

 **A/N: This one honestly did very little to advance the "plot." But damn, was it fun to write. Chapter 9 forthcoming.**

 **PS: I just realized that (assuming I finish everything I have planned), we're already (or only, if you're a pessimist) just beyond the half way point. Crazy how time flies.**


	11. The River

**(Chapter 11: The River)**

 **A/N: Tag to 6x06 ("Seal Hunter"). Deeks is easy… at least for Kensi. Are you surprised?**

 **I recently received a request to explain what any of this has to do with poker. Arguably, poker can be used as an analogy for just about any aspect of life. But in addition to responding with a link to the Texas Hold 'Em wikipedia page, I decided to reward this particular reader (and thus all of you) with a** ** _very_** **brief overview of some terms included in chapter titles, or snuck in the rest of the content. Because, hey, we don't all have the same knowledge bases.**

 **Rating: M for Muy caliente.**

 **(That's "very hot" for all you non-Spanish speakers (Side note: don't even ask me to try and write anything like this in Spanish… sería muy doloroso para todos los involucrados)).**

* * *

"Professional poker, Deeks? _Really_? There's nothing better to watch on TV?" Kensi chided at a drowsy looking Deeks sprawled out on his couch as she closed his front door behind her.

"What?" Deeks awoke with a start. "What time is it?"

"It's seven PM. I'm here with burritos, as was planned. Remember?" she replied from the kitchen, rummaging for some beers in his fridge. "Wait, were you asleep?"

"No."

" _Right_ ," she drawled skeptically. She made her way to the living room with their dinner and plopped down on the couch next to him. "Maybe the smell of that god-awful fruit knocked you out."

"I wasn't _really_ watching this," Deeks said groggily in response to her very first question.

"I never understood why it's on TV at all, much less the _sports_ channel," Kensi countered.

"Well, some people are into it. And I guess some people could learn from watching?" Deeks reasoned. "After all, the terminology and rules of Texas Hold 'Em can get a little confusing."

"Do tell," Kensi asked sardonically.

Not picking up on her subtle sarcasm, Deeks continued, "Look, the commentators just mentioned 'burning a card.' It's a card that's discarded, or 'burned,' before each advance in play to make sure no one could recognize any marks on the back of the top card."

Deeks wasn't even looking at Kensi when she rolled her eyes at him. He added, "This first trio of community cards after initial bets is called—"

"The flop," Kensi interjected. "After a round of betting the next communal card dealt is 'the turn.' The last one is 'the river.' Players bet or fold between each. And after the final round of betting, there's the showdown; where remaining players reveal their two cards to see who has the best five card hand."

Deeks looked at her in impressed silence. With eyebrows raised he grinned and asked, "You learn all that from watching poker on TV?"

"Not from watching this! Look at that idiot, he just raised on an off-suit 2-6! That's literally the worst hand you can get!" she responded incredulously.

"He could be bluffing," Deeks suggested.

"Unlikely. There's four other players still in this hand and two high hearts showing, so it's a protected pot. He's got no hearts, no pairs, and he's got to know that chances are good someone's working on a flush out the backdoor and won't be easily bluffed into walking away," she explained plainly. "You just watch. He's gonna end up folding, and that's just dead money on the table."

"Hold on, hold on. How do you know all of this?" Deeks asked suspiciously. "I thought you said you _hated_ Vegas?"

"I said I'm ' _so over_ Vegas.' And that doesn't mean I hate poker," she clarified.

"Ahhh. Now I remember." The realization dawning on him, Deeks continued, "Your dad taught you how to wire a house, shoot a gun, fix an engine, change a tire," he paused for a dramatic breath before rambling on, "track game, camp in the wilderness, collect comic books, and somewhere in there, how to play poker too."

"Yup," she responded proudly. "And most importantly, he taught me to resist the temptation of trying for a low straight."

They never did get around to changing the channel while they ate. Conversation came easy to them as it always did. Kensi told him about the time she went undercover as a dealer at an illegal casino. Deeks told her about the one run by the Yakuza they had shut down while she was gone. And they both reminisced in silly poker and gambling stories going all the way back to their college days and before.

"I actually learned how to play poker in high school," Deeks informed her.

"Late bloomer," Kensi teased. "I played my first hands when I was eight. My dad let me interrupt his game with some other NCO's on base."

"Well," Deeks continued, nervously scratching at his mop of bangs. "The circumstances of my first game were a bit more… grown up."

"Let me guess," Kensi laughed. "You got some poor girl to play strip poker with you?"

"Correction, _she_ persuaded _me_. And also, I didn't know the rules, so she convinced me that she won almost every hand, even when in retrospect she hadn't." Laughing, he added, "I ended up damn near naked and she had taken off only her sweatshirt and socks. It was pretty unsatisfying. Especially when I had to hide with my clothes under her bed when her dad came upstairs. She told him she was playing solitaire and he stayed for an hour while they played gin."

Kensi was laughing at him in earnest now. "I suppose she didn't have to try very hard to convince you to play?"

Deeks shrugged. "She was hot. I was sixteen."

Shaking her head at him, she teased, "And you were trying to convince me today that you're _not_ that easy."

"Well, you would know," Deeks responded in a gravely voice and with a glint in his eyes that always sent a jolt straight through her chest… and then much lower.

"It's true," she conceded. "All I have to do is show you my bra and you go from 'chill' to 'hot and bothered' in about three seconds."

"I'm not _that_ easy, I swear."

"Prove it," Kensi challenged, rising from the couch. She peeled her shirt off of her toned torso, dropped it on his lap and sauntered back to his bedroom.

She removed her socks, took her hair down and unbuckled her jeans before sitting casually on his mattress. She waited for over a minute, reflecting on how annoyed, embarrassed, and unsatisfied she'll feel if he doesn't give in. ' _Oh well, he'll have to come back here at some point tonight'_ , she thought to herself stubbornly. Just as she was about to reach into her pocket for her phone to idly play some games, she heard Deeks curse quietly in defeat from his living room, and the unmistakable sounds of him padding barefoot back towards where she waited in his bed.

"Ha!" she laughed at him triumphantly when he entered his room, already removing his shirt.

"Laugh it up, but you're the one seducing me," he reminded her from the foot of his bed, as he dropped his pants.

"You were getting checked out by _everyone_ today," she agreed, casually fiddling with her own waistband . "That crazy ex-SEAL was into your hair—"

"Yeah, and you hung me out as cougar bait for that receptionist," Deeks said accusingly.

"It worked," she shrugged, now free of her bra as well.

"Sort of," Deeks admitted. "And _you_ totally ogled my ass this morning."

"Again, I was spotting you in case you fell," she corrected him.

"Spotting my _glorious_ butt, maybe. It's hard _not_ to spot!" Deeks asserted as he finally joined her on the bed. Having crawled into Kensi's waiting arms and melded his lips with hers, Deeks was unable to add any additional comments to their flirtatious banter.

Both were still clad in their underwear. Captivated by his soft lips, his hard body, and his strong hands, Kensi didn't feel inclined to rush them along. Instead she ran her hands across all of his skin she could reach; rubbing his shoulders, squeezing his biceps, caressing his back and finally massaging his admittedly ' _glorious_ ' butt.

Deeks also seemed content with their slow pace. With one arm holding himself up, the other was free to migrate. His hand made its way from the curve of her hips, up her flat stomach, and to the swell of her bare breasts. Then back down again to toy with the elastic on her panties.

Finally, it seemed, he had grown impatient… he had certainly grown harder, if the bulge against Kensi's thigh was any indication. Leaning back, he shimmied Kensi's simple underwear down, and tossed them aside. Kneeling at the foot of the bed, he kissed his way up her legs until he was laying flat between them.

Now at eye level with her glistening folds, Deeks paused and simply parted them with his fingers, admiring the view. Kensi rolled her eyes and hooked a leg around his shoulders to draw him in.

"Now who's _ogling_?" she asked impatiently.

His face was so close to her that when he responded, she could feel his hot breath on her. "Can you blame me? I never get tired of this sight."

Kensi's chuckle subsided as soon as his tongue connected with her pussy. If Deeks never tired of having his face buried between her legs, she wouldn't complain. He kissed and suckled up and down the pink flesh of her slit, and every time his tongue grazed against the sensitive bundle of nerves at the top, Kensi writhed and bucked her hips. Her sharp breaths grew into moans, and she finally ceased resisting the urge to run her hands through his unruly mop of hair.

Kensi cried out sharply when she came. Deeks had not really used his fingers within her, so the sensations of pleasure that overcame her were restricted exclusively— _intensely_ to the now pulsing bundle of nerves Deeks still had his tongue on. He let his tongue wander for several moments more, lapping up the taste of her arousal, before kissing a trail back up her abdomen.

He dropped a kiss to every one of her ab muscles, each visibly defined every time she exhaled sharply. Her breasts received similar treatment, though he paused to swirl his tongue lazily around her nipples before continuing his way up her body.

Impatiently, Kensi leaned up to close the last few inches of the gap between their lips. Deeks groaned into her aggressive kiss, and responded by pressing her back into his pillows. Kensi would have none of it, though. Pushing on his shoulders and tangling her legs in his, she quickly turned him over and sat on top of his thighs.

She leaned over him, her hair draping over his face. He pulled her torso towards him even further, allowing him to capture her breasts in his mouth again. Shifting down his body, she planted one last lingering kiss to his lips before beginning to leave a trail of wet, open mouthed kisses down his smooth chest.

"Did you grow a new chest hair?" she asked him jokingly, a bright smile spread across her face as she stroked at the ultra-fine blonde hairs between his pecs.

Without missing a beat, Deeks responded, "Yeah, just sprouted a third. Now I have almost half as many as you!"

"That was just mean!"

"Come on, that was at _least_ a touché," he reasoned, caressing his hands along her thighs that still straddled him.

"You're going to pay for that," she growled, pinching one of his nipples and dragging her nails along his chest as she continued to shift down his body.

Unable to reach her anymore, Deeks tucked his hands behind his head and replied, "God, I hope so!"

Kensi smiled mischievously back up at him when she reached the level of his waist band. Now seemed like the perfect moment to execute a little revenge for all of the times he'd teased her; all of the times he'd practically made her beg to be touched.

She slowly began to peel back the elastic of his boxers until the base of his growing erection was just barely exposed. Deeks whined when she stopped and glanced up at him. The veins of his thick cock were showing, and he visibly strained against the material that still held him down.

"Kens?" he asked, whispering harshly; a hint of desperation evident in his tone. His biceps flexed above his shoulders as he tensed in expectation.

 _Excellent_ , she thought to herself, massaging gently over the fabric just next to his trapped manhood. She ghosted her lips over the clothed bulge and felt him twitch beneath her.

In his distress, Deeks tried to bargain. "This is really mean. And if you keep doing this, I may not last… you wouldn't want that, now would you?"

"What happened to your world famous stamina?" she chided, running her fingers along his thighs and beneath his boxers.

"I… um—" Deeks' voice may have even cracked when she almost brushed her fingers against his shaft. Appearing to know he was beaten at his own game, he changed tactics and attempted flattery instead. "You may be the _only_ woman hot enough, and with enough seductive prowess to uh… take me down before my time."

"Nice try," Kensi said flatly. She sat up entirely on her knees between his ankles and adjusted her hair; putting herself on display for him, yet adding to his frustration.

Deeks whimpered again and brought his hands together on his stomach. Pulling his best puppy dog eyes and pouty lips he surrendered and flat out begged. "Kens? Baby? Please?"

Kensi's eyes narrowed at him for an instant when he called her 'baby' for the first time. But her glare turned into a smirk when she decided that she didn't hate it; and that she liked how in her power he was at that moment. She bent over and hooked her fingers under his waistband, pulling his boxers down another few inches.

Finally, he sprang free. His cock was rigid, throbbing, and flushed almost purple in anticipation. She had barely touched him and already a tiny pearl of precum had seeped from the head of his dick.

She wrapped her long fingers around his girth and pumped him a few times, tickling the sensitive bunch of skin at the bottom of his tip with her tongue. Deeks hissed and squirmed in her grip. Still unable to really reach her body, he settled on tucking a strand of flyaway hair behind her ear.

"Fuck, Kens! You don't know what you're doing to me!" Deeks growled, barely in control of his countenance.

Kensi's lips were around his cock, so she only moaned in response. But she knew damn well what she was doing to him, and she was quite pleased with herself.

The look on Deeks' face was one of pure bliss, and she smiled up at him as she tugged on him a few more times to spread her saliva all along the shaft. Finally, she released him and crawled up his body. Her hair and her breasts dangled enticingly in his face as she placed her hands on the pillow behind him.

Deeks planted his feet flat on the bed and reached behind her to guide his cock to her entrance. She sank down on him as he pushed up, and both partners let out a breathy moan once he had filled her completely.

Kensi set the pace and started to ride him hard and fast. Deeks stayed still until he was sure he had regained control of himself, then he began to thrust up to meet her. Her ass slapped against his thighs almost as loudly as she was panting. She bent at the elbow so she could drop down and kiss him sloppily.

Deeks moaned noisily and wrapped his arms around her torso to keep her chest flat against his. He drove up into her with force, pausing every few strokes to feel her inner muscles convulse around him; her second orgasm coming on strong.

Kensi leaned back as the climax rushed through her, opening her scrunched eyes after several seconds to see him smiling up at her. His hair was matted to his face, and she pushed it from his brow as she caught her breath, making it messier than usual.

Despite his concerns about his own longevity, Deeks was still rigid within her. She plopped on her back at his side, and he turned to roll her further. With her chest flat against the bed, Kensi sprawled her left leg off to the side to allow him access and looked back over her shoulder to see him crawl over her body.

She moaned as he pushed inside of her again. The angle allowing him to reach deeper while simultaneously keeping her tighter around him. Deeks' hands were planted firmly on the mattress on either side of Kensi's ribs. She let go of the sheets she had been clinging to and instead covered his hands with hers as he continued to ram into her. With each thrust, he hit just the right spot over, and over, and over again.

For the third time that evening, Kensi felt a delicious pressure at her core topple into a full blown explosion. This most recent climax caused her whole body to shake, her eyes to slam shut, and her breaths to be so harsh that she could not even call his name, though she tried.

Deeks was running on fumes and he used the last of his energy to thrust into her, once, twice, three times more before the symphony of sensations finally pulled him over the edge. He managed to swear through his moans when he finally dropped to his elbows on top of her, the fierceness of his orgasm draining his remaining strength.

"Deeks! Can't… Breathe!" Kensi grumbled into her pillow.

He rolled off of her and faced her to say in jest, "It was that good, huh? Took your breath away?"

She turned over so she could see him. "And you think _my_ puns are bad," she said, her chest heaving with each exhausted breath.

"You know you love it," he asserted, rolling out of bed and searching for his boxers.

Kensi smiled weakly at his back when the reality of her feelings sunk in again. She was in trouble. She did love it. And she loved him.

* * *

 **A/N: Dun dun dun.**

 **Next chapter is underway. And I also started another little one shot to give myself a break from this season 6 slog. So be on the lookout!**

 **Thanks again for the reviews. I read every one!**


	12. Bluffing

**(Chapter 12: Bluffing)**

 **A/N: This chapter pairs well with a nice, dark Syrah, and episode 6x08 ("The Grey Man"). Our heroes take another painful, yet important step towards getting their shit together.**

 **Rating: As per usual, this is all just an elaborate setup for "M" rated content.**

* * *

 _Ninety-five, ninety-six, ninety-seven_ — a knock on the door caused Kensi to pause momentarily. But she really wanted to finish this set of crunches, so she continued. _Ninety-eight, ninety-nine, one hundred_. Grunting a little from the effort of getting up off her living room floor, she quickly threw a shirt on over her sports bra before padding over barefoot to see who was at the door at this hour.

"Deeks? I wouldn't have put a shirt on if I knew it was you," she said smiling and stepping aside to let the shaggy detective and his shaggier dog through her door. "I thought you were going home?"

"I was, and I did… But something wasn't sitting right with me," he answered a little mysteriously. He unclipped Monty's leash, and the dog sniffed Kensi for only a moment before heading to the dog bed she kept for him there. Deeks motioned to the small mat Kensi had rolled out on her floor and asked, "A little late night workout?"

"What?" she said, turning to look in the direction he had pointed before answering. "Oh, yeah. I literally just started. Hey, you okay? Is it anything I can help with?"

"No, yeah. I'm fine. I just… wanted… to see you. To talk to you," Deeks offered with a warm smile.

Kensi considered him shrewdly and came to two conclusions. First, she was certain he had come over for a booty call, as was typical these days. She was finally truly comfortable with what they had together. They were closer than ever, but the 'thing' between them was still light. And she always got the sense that Deeks had a metaphorical foot out the door and had left the engine running, just in case. But that didn't bother her anymore, because she trusted him.

Second, he was being strange tonight. Well, stranger than usual. So she decided to go along with him for the moment. Grinning broadly, she asked him, "No quip about knowing 'a better way to work out?'"

Deeks laughed softly and replied, "You beat me to it, I guess."

"Don't tell me you're off your game?" she chided him, nudging him gently in the shoulder with her knuckles.

"I'm just thinking about… other stuff I want to say," he said vaguely.

Kensi couldn't be less interested in playing a guessing game at that moment. She could see that however reserved Deeks was acting, he wasn't visibly hurting, mentally or otherwise. She wanted to be there as a friend for him, but had never been very good at getting him to open up. If something was bothering him though, she knew a sure fire way of testing his resolve to talk about it.

"I was hoping you were thinking about stuff you want to _do,_ " she said in a low voice, and added a wink for good measure.

"You, Special Agent Blye, are insatiable," Deeks accused, cocking his head and squinting at her as she stepped closer to him.

"And you, Detective Deeks," she began to reply, inches from his face, "are holding out on me. My blood's pumping, I'm ready to go! So spill your guts, or drop your pants. You're doing both tonight, so hop to it."

Deeks assessed his options; his jaw jutted forward, brows furrowed. His blue eyes darted back and forth between her dark eye and her light one. He appeared to be weighing the pros and cons of the alternatives she had laid before him. Then his features softened and his eyes closed as he chose the latter, and closed the gap between them.

"Good choice," Kensi told him, tilting her chin up to meet his lips.

Deeks pulled her closer as he deepened their kiss. Kensi then surprised him by wrapping her arms around his neck and jumping onto him, curling her long legs around his hips. Stumbling back slightly, he managed to catch her and hold her up. Pausing only to slip his sandals off in the foyer, he turned and carried her in the direction of her bedroom.

He navigated the minefield of laundry and shoes on the floor of her room, and sat them down on the edge of the mattress; their lips barely parting the whole journey. Kensi reached down to slide his shirt up, her fingers running over the bumpy ridges of the muscles that covered his ribs. Deeks lifted his arms to allow her to fully toss aside his shirt, then brought them back down to her waist to do the same for her.

As Deeks continued to lavish her with kisses, Kensi's hand had impatiently slipped beneath her yoga pants to toy with the tingling sensation between her legs. Seeing this and having none of it, Deeks finally broke the kiss to roll Kensi to her back and peel the tight pants and underwear down her calves and ankles. He took the break in action as an opportunity to remove his own remaining clothing as well. Once Kensi had flung aside her sports bra, there was no longer anything separating them.

Deeks picked up where Kensi had left off, and his fingers delved between her folds to stoke her arousal. His free hand held her writhing hips in place and his lips descended on her breasts, sucking as much of the soft flesh into his open mouth as he could.

With nothing for her own lips to reach, Kensi was unable to stifle the soft moans that had begun to escape her. In their months as lovers, she had expected to grow accustomed to his methods. But he continued to surprise her with how quickly and skillfully he was able to get her worked up and bring her to climax.

With two of his fingers inside of her and his thumb rubbing circles at her clit, Kensi came. Deeks' lips found hers and he stole away her cry of ecstasy with a heart stopping kiss.

Kensi had not yet gotten her hands on his manhood, thus didn't even know he was already hard when he pleasantly surprised her by pushing into her slowly. The pulsations of her orgasm had not yet died down, and instead intensified to the point of being blissfully— if just barely, not painful when he sank all the way in.

"Deeks— _fuck_!" she moaned into his neck, her nails scratching at his back.

He didn't even register the pain she caused him as he brought his face within centimeters of hers. He held steady until her eyes, darkened with desire, opened to meet his. Deeks held Kensi's gaze for many long moments before he closed his eyes, kissed her again, and finally started to move within her.

He drove slowly, but with intention; pulling out all the way before plunging back in as deep as he could go. Each time he pushed in entirely, he paused, nudging his hips to add extra pressure against her aching nub. Kensi's toes curled and her muscles clenched with every one of his thrusts.

Her moans turned into a disappointed whimper when he pulled out of her and laid on the bed next to her. She rolled towards him and made to straddle his lap, but Deeks was on his side and pulled her so her back was to him; her ass pressed against his groin.

He snuck a hand under her waist to hold her closer to him, while the other snaked between her legs to guide his still slick cock back to her welcoming warmth. She rested her upper leg on his to keep herself open, and his now free hand wrapped around her waist where he linked his fingers with hers.

With speed and strength, he plowed into her from behind. Her hands clutched at his and she rocked her hips back into each of his thrusts, willing him to go deeper. Deeks' lips were latched onto her neck and shoulders, sucking at the soft skin. Kensi was in raptures at the sensations of his tongue on her body, his fingers entwined with hers at her breasts and belly, and the frantic rhythm with which he was slamming into her.

As her breathy moans began to escape from her more frequently, she looked for something with which to occupy her mouth. She shifted slightly so she could turn her head to him, and managed to surprise him when she claimed his busy lips in a desperate kiss.

"Deeks!" she encouraged him when his lips broke from hers for air. "Come on!"

"Ahhhhhgh! Kens!" he snarled into her hair before kicking his already hurried pace into a purely chaotic one.

He finally released her hand from his so he could dip it under her thigh again; both to hold up her tiring leg and to work on her clit with his fingers. Her free hand dropped to help his apply more pressure as he continued to pound into her.

Kensi's mind was mush. She could think of nothing but the tight coil in her core, and how each time he crashed into her, he pushed her closer and closer to the ecstatic relief she craved so badly. Deeks reached the edge they were careening towards first and pulled his arm around her waist as tightly as he could while he emptied himself within her.

He had stilled and she could feel him pulsating inside of her. She arched back into him to try and generate as much friction as she could. Deeks was still buried in her and rubbed at her clit vigorously with his fingers until finally, euphorically, she came. Kensi didn't form any coherent words, but she did cry out as loud as ever she had before.

For several minutes they lay there, spooning and catching their breath as one. Finally they had cooled off, Deeks had softened and they separated. He pulled the covers up and Kensi prepared to tease him about something or other from earlier in the day before remembering that he had wanted to tell her something.

"Oh, hey! What is it you wanted to talk about when you got here?" she asked him casually.

"You mean before you literally jumped me?" he inquired, rolling to face her from his side.

"Something like that," she smiled, tucking her tousled hair behind her ears. "Seriously, what's bugging you?"

"Kensi," Deeks started, his face turning serious as he built up his resolve. "You said today that you only want me to see the best parts of you. But that's bullshit."

"What?" she asked, her brows furrowing.

"I want to know all of you," Deeks went on. "The bad parts and the good. And whether or not you want to, I need you to know the bad parts of me too."

"Deeks—"

"Just, let me get this out. Okay?" he interjected, a little distress in his voice. Pausing a moment, he took a deep breath before continuing. "In Afghanistan, there was a cleric. The father of someone in the Taliban."

"The old man you traded for me and Jack?" she asked, her features full of concern but her tone flat. She had read Deeks' report on how they acquired him, but there was little written about what went on for the full day he had been in Deeks' custody.

"Yes. Granger left me with his contact in the Afghan army, Sergeant Makar. We were supposed to see what the old guy knew. He wouldn't say much," Deeks paused again and sat up on the bed, waist still below the sheets. Looking down at her he said, "And then I saw that picture…"

"That… the one where they faked my death?" Kensi asked, the shock clearly evident in her voice. She sat up to meet his eyes at the same level, pulling the sheets up around her. Shaking her head, she asked disbelievingly, "Hetty actually sent it to you?"

"She didn't want to. But I made her…" he trailed off and lowered his gaze. Kensi simply listened patiently, sensing the difficulty he was having in forming his next words. Deeks continued, "She was right. She shouldn't have. Something in me _snapped_. I was convinced that you were… that I had lost you forever. I'm not even sure how I thought it would help, but I wanted to destroy _everyone_ who was remotely connected with hurting you.

"So…" he took another deep breath and closed his eyes, before snapping them open and meeting her questioning gaze with his eyes so clearly in anguish. Quietly, in barely a whisper, but very clearly Deeks said, "I tortured the old man… I water boarded him."

Kensi's mouth opened almost imperceptibly. She had so many questions forming in her mind. Part of her wanted to sock him, but the time for that was long past and she was sure from his tormented eyes that he had been beating himself up enough. Part of her wanted to reach out and hold him, but it was clear he wasn't finished talking yet. Not even a little portion of her wanted to leave though. No, she knew her place was right where she was; listening to whatever he had to say next.

"A few seconds later I realized what I was doing and I stopped," Deeks continued, tears welling up in the corners of his pained blue eyes. "I started… crying and just held him." Shaking his head again he frowned in anger as he admonished himself. "Me of all people… I know. I don't understand… _how_ I could do that."

"But you didn't. You stopped!" Kensi reasoned, reaching out and putting her hand over his restless knee.

"That doesn't make up for the fact that I was willing to in the first place," he argued. Hunching over, he scratched at his hair nervously before making his next point. "And here's the thing: as much as I regret it; as much as it _haunts_ me… I'm pretty sure I would do it again if I thought it could help save you."

"Deeks… You can't blame yourself—"

"Oh, but I can," he interrupted, then added woefully, "It's what I'm best at."

Kensi waited patiently for more, but Deeks seemed to have exhausted his list of things he needed to say. So she asked him gently, "You've been carrying this around this whole time?"

"Yes."

Kensi shook her head slowly, her heart aching in empathy with him. "Does Hetty know?"

"Yes."

"The rest of the team?" she asked, fearful she was the only one in the dark.

He thought a moment before responding, "No. I don't think so. Not unless she told them."

She considered him for a long time. Deeks was watching her just as intently, and it dawned on her that this is what had been bothering him for months; what he had said he needed to figure out on his own last spring.

Seeking confirmation, she asked him, "This is what you've been hiding?"

" _Hiding_ is a strong word," he reasoned.

"Why you you wanted to slow things down?" she clarified. "Keep it casual? Because you thought I couldn't handle it?"

"No! It's not that. I—"

"Then you were afraid of what I would say when I found out?"

"I, uh—" he groaned, shrugging slightly. "Something like that. I don't exactly have the best excuses to offer in my defense."

"And now that I know…?" she asked expectantly, unsure of what she wanted the answer to be.

"I don't know," he smiled weakly. "But I've been ready for this— for _us_ — for a long time. I just needed you to know the truth first."

If you can name an emotion, Kensi experienced it on some level in that moment. Anger, relief, joy, sadness, regret, bitterness, pity, and apprehension were among the ones she felt most acutely.

She had spent all of this time— _months_ , waiting for him. She had figured that Deeks still didn't know what he wanted to do with his life, or that he didn't know how to be in a serious relationship. Perhaps both of those things were still true, but whatever she was expecting, it wasn't this. Unable to think of how exactly to respond, she stared at him sadly and shook her head.

"It's a lot to process, I know," he said, looking at her despairingly.

Blinking and tilting her head to examine him she stated, "That's actually not what I'm thinking about… You tackled me again today."

"What?" Deeks asked, taken aback at the abrupt topic change. "Yeah? I— A building was exploding behind me."

"I was trying to shoot a cartel guy coming out after you," she reminded him.

"And you did."

"Deeks…" she warned.

"What do you want me to say?" he shrugged.

She shook her head again and willed the sting in her eyes to go away before tears formed. She had become convinced that this was for the best. That this was as good as it was going to get. That it was enough. That they would never be able to think about serious things like marriage or a family, or even just being in a steady relationship. What had started out as a bluff to protect herself had turned into what she actually believed to be true.

"You don't need to keep protecting me," she told him softly. "You say you're finally ready… but what will it be like when— _if_ we really get serious? If this is how it's gonna be—"

"I can do better, I promise," he interjected. Looking at her firmly the told her, "But I will _never_ stop protecting you. You're my partner, and that's not going to change!"

"How are we supposed to do our jobs?" she asked, the desperation in her voice rising by the minute.

He chuckled weakly. "Now you know how I've felt these last few months. Even before, really."

She noticed that her muscles were tensed and she had been hugging the sheet to her torso like a safety blanket. She breathed deeply and tried to relax. What's done is done, and they needed to decide how to move forward… or not.

"It's waaaaay too late to turn back now… even if I wanted to," she reasoned aloud, giving him hope. "And splitting us up would be worse, I think. I don't want to spend all day worrying because I'm not there to watch your back; not knowing you're safe."

"I agree completely," he nodded. Testing the water, he took her hand that rested on his knee.

"Do we just keep… sleeping together?" she wondered, her face scrunched up in confusion. "I don't want this to end."

"Neither do I," he responded wistfully. "Hey, we don't need to figure this out today." She returned his hand's firm grip and shifted closer to him on the bed. "It's okay. Take some time, figure it out. I'll still be here."

She held his gaze again, thinking to herself momentarily that they should have had this talk _before_ having sex. She then immediately disagreed with herself; she had seduced _him_ , after all. And if this ends, then at least she'll have had one last time with him to remember.

"Should I stay?" he asked hopefully.

"I don't know," she answered in barely a whisper. Their bare legs still touched beneath the sheets.

He tried again, changing the question slightly. "Do you want me to go?"

Sure of the answer this time, she shook her head with finality. "No."

The corner of Deeks' lips curved up slightly as he continued to look at her longingly. She reached over for the lamp switch on her night stand and shrouded them in darkness. No longer able to see him, she felt for his hand. Laying flat again, she pulled him down into her arms and nestled her head onto his chest. Deeks remained silent and held her tight, as if he was afraid she would slip away.

"I'm not sure what I want anymore," she told him quietly. "But I'm not going anywhere right now."

* * *

 **A/N: As they would say in televised poker (which I swear, I don't** ** _actually_** **watch), "Action to Kensi."**

 **Some time after I wrote the outline, I dreaded watching this chapter get closer and closer. I even added one or two chapters in order to postpone the inevitable. What started out as an excuse to write a dozen steamy, interconnected fics turned into way more of a drama than I anticipated. Friggin' story arcs…**


	13. Check, Raise

**(Chapter 13: Check, Raise)**

 **A/N: 6x09 ("Traitor"): the first of many mole-hunts, was also a catalyst for some sweet Densi moments that I allude to (and also Neric moments, that I barely mention… Sorry, but this story isn't about them).**

 **Rating: It is literally impossible for you to have made it to this point without accidentally reading one of my not-so-subtle (in fact, quite direct) references to genitals and what can be done with them. As such, you don't get a content warning for this chapter.**

* * *

Laughing boisterously, Deeks keyed into his apartment and shrugged off the fact that his dog greeted Kensi more enthusiastically than he ever greeted him. Continuing their ongoing conversation about their coworkers, he declared, "Ah! Young nerd love!"

"For real though?" Kensi laughed, tossing her bag on Deeks' coffee table and focusing her affection on the shaggy mutt in the room… specifically the canine one. "Is that really happening? Romance up in Ops?"

"Is it so hard to believe?" he asked dramatically, watching her carefully. Then quieter, "Its happening with us."

Kensi straightened up to look at him, "Is it, though?"

"You tell me," he asked plainly.

"Abrupt subject change!" Kensi declared, kicking her boots off. "I've never had someone try to kill me with a plant before. So that's a new one."

Deeks looked at his feet and smiled sheepishly. It seemed that she wasn't going to talk yet, and that was okay. Neither of them had mustered up the guts to talk about their relationship again, Instead, they had let a couple of tense, awkward days pass after their last conversation, before carrying on as they had been like nothing had changed. Truthfully, in that instant it may have been for the best. They had both had a few drinks with dinner, and were more handsy than emotional at the moment.

Mirroring her actions and following her new topic of conversation, he replied, "It's ironic that the wolfsbane plant he tried to kill you with was the same shade of blue that I know you so love."

Deeks waited patiently in the living room, leaning on the wall. Kensi hadn't committed to the couch yet, and was instead putting her leftovers away in Deeks' fridge. She laughed at him and said, "A, that's not irony, it's a coincidence. B, the flowers aren't cornflower blue. And C—"

"Yes they are."

"—No they're not, they're more purple-ish— And C, could you have been any _creepier_ today?" Muttering, she added, "Sniffing my hair like a damn serial killer."

"Yes," Deeks replied enthusiastically to her last comment. "I can always be creepier. And could _you_ have been any stingier with your food tonight? All I wanted was one bite!"

"Share my food? Are you nuts?" she cried incredulously. "Clearly you don't actually know me at all."

"I know you plenty well," he argued, putting his hands in his pockets and puffing out his chest.

Kensi smiled at his cocky grin and posture. Walking over to him, she asked, "If your knowledge of me is so deep, tell me: what else do you know about me?"

Deeks moved even closer, so their chests were touching. Kensi's breath hitched when he tucked her hair gently behind her ears and leaned in. Deeks brushed his lips along her neck, and breathed deeply. Whispering, he told her, "I know you secretly like it when I smell your hair."

She swallowed hard and met his eyes. He could see fire and anticipation in them, and they were so dark with desire, he could barely tell them apart in the half light of his dimly lit living room. He snuck his arms below hers, and grabbed his own wrist behind her back, pulling her to him.

"I know that unlike most people, you tilt your head to the left when you kiss," he said moments before capturing her lips. She had indeed tilted her head to the left, and smiled against his lips. He broke for air and added, "Which is super hot, by the way—"

Before he could babble on, she kissed him again, keeping his head close to hers with both of her hands. It was unnecessary, really. Because he had no intention of going anywhere. Deeks deepened the kiss and coaxed her mouth open with his tongue, delving in and sucking gently on her upper lip as she lightly bit his own.

The pair had moved to Deeks' couch, and she roughly pushed him down onto the cushions. Deeks pulled her onto his lap, and she wrapped her arms around his shoulders again, turning her upper body so she could press her chest to his.

"This," she said, pulling off his sweatshirt and holding it up before tossing it aside, "is cornflower blue."

"Mh-hmm," he moaned his agreement into her mouth, his lips having found hers again in a sloppy kiss.

As tender as their embraces were, their hands were growing more frantic. Each tugging at the other's shirts, and breaking apart just long enough to pull them up and over their heads. As soon as the new skin was revealed to him, Deeks shifted his attention to her neck, her shoulder, her collar bone, her chest, and finally her covered breasts. His hands deftly unclasped her bra, and he used his chin to nuzzle the silky fabric aside enough to grant his greedy lips access.

Deeks hummed as he inched closer to the tender pink skin on one of her breasts. Pausing, he brought his eyes level to hers. Before dropping back down to the soft mounds, he said in a gravelly voice, "I know you'll moan when I suck on your tits."

As he purposefully drew one of the pink buds into his mouth, she did indeed let out a quiet moan. The vibrations of his low voice as he chuckled into her skin sent shivers across her body. When he was satisfied with how hard her first nipple had become, he shifted his attention to the other, leaving a trail of wet kisses through the valley of her breasts.

Kensi seemed determined not to let out another sound, but a tiny whimper escaped her lips when he grazed his teeth oh so gently along the sensitive skin. He brought his free hand up to gently massage her breasts, now wet from his tongue. After fully removing her bra and inspecting his work one last time, he leaned in for another breath stealing kiss. Keeping their lips locked and holding her close to him, he gently lowered her down to the couch opposite of him.

Deeks had every intention of taking it slower; of savoring their languid caresses. But before he could calm her busy hands, Kensi had unbuckled her belt and had pushed her jeans and panties half way down her thighs. He knew this mood of hers well by now, and was left with no choice but to assist her before she did it all herself.

She shifted up the couch to lay more comfortably against the pillows, then waited expectantly for him to get on with it. Deeks couldn't help but smile at her. This aspect of their arrangement had grown so routine that she had become predictable. And he found himself hoping that someday soon they could finally drop the fear and apprehension, and just be together without all the uncertainty and games.

With that final thought in mind, he held her gaze as he placed a slow, tender kiss right above the wet opening of her pussy. She sighed sharply and threw her head back, before looking at him again and silently pleading with him for more with her eyes. She whimpered and writhed as he tickled her clit with the tip of his tongue, and slammed her eyes shut as she tried to keep it together.

He paused and peered up at her, waiting for her to meet his gaze. She did, and she shot him a look filled with equal parts impatience and desperation. He gave her a cocky smirk and told her, "I know that you'll try to resist grabbing my hair, but you will anyways."

Her hands had been taking her frustration and delight out on the pillows and cushions she rested on. At his suggestion, she gripped them tighter and visibly restrained herself from reaching to grab his silky hair. Deeks chuckled, and his hot breath on her flushed skin served to stoke the fire in her core even more. His tongue alternated between slow circles and quick laps, and with each of his ministrations, he brought her closer and closer to her sweet release.

When every one of her muscles was tensed in expectation; her heels digging into his shoulders, her back arched, her breasts heaving up and down with her deep breaths, only then did she finally reach down and hold on to his wavy locks for dear life as she rode the wave of ecstasy that crashed over her.

Deeks had the decency not to laugh, and instead helped her come down off of her high. He slowly kissed her throbbing bundle of nerves, soothing the stimulation by rubbing his hands along her thighs.

Wiping his mouth on the back of his hand, he crawled up to lay beside her flushed body; squeezed between her and the back of the couch. Tangling her fingers in his hair once more, she pulled him in for a kiss to steal the smirk off of his face. Again, Deeks was content to let this moment last for much longer. And again, Kensi had other plans.

She sent her hands down his chest, grazing along the skin stretched over his muscled torso. Immediately, she found the fastenings holding him in at the waist of his pants. Before Deeks could even shift his weight enough to free up a hand to help her, she had his belt and button undone and was reaching in his jeans to grasp him.

"Kens!" he called out in what he had hoped was a warning, but was pretty sure came out as a plea. She giggled at him and he knew, yep… definitely a plea.

She swallowed his complaint with a demanding kiss, and was pushing and pulling on him impatiently. He was still mostly stuck in his pants, and it was both embarrassing and impressive how quickly he had gone from fairly aroused to a full on, rock hard erection at her touch.

He reluctantly broke free and sat back on the other end of the couch so he could escape from his uncomfortably confining jeans. She didn't wait for him to return to her. Rather, she followed him over, laying down with her breasts dragging over his now bare thighs.

"I suppose you know what I'm going to do next?" she asked him in a low voice, grasping the base of his shaft and pumping slowly.

"I do."

"Yeah? Tell me," she demanded.

"I know that you'll _try_ to get me off with your mouth," he responded in a snarky tone, sucking in a quick breath when her tongue made contact with the swollen head of his cock. "And I'll have to stop you before you do, you sneaky minx."

It appeared to Deeks as if Kensi had taken his words as a challenge, and he was not complaining. At all. Her hands tugged on the soft skin stretched thin around his engorged shaft, while her tongue swirled around the tip. She took him into her mouth and bobbed up and down, working in tandem with her long fingers wrapped around his base. For a blissful minute or two she went on like this. Deeks caressed her forearms and moaned appreciatively the whole time, until he remembered himself.

Cupping her face with both of his hands, he pulled her off of his dick somewhat reluctantly. She released him from her lips with a pop, and crawled up onto his lap. Deeks was sitting upright with his shoulders pressed into the back of the couch. He helped steady her hips with his hands as she slid up to straddle him.

Kensi put her hands on his chest and leaned her forehead against his. She pressed a soft kiss to his lips while she waited restlessly for him to move into position below her. Deeks sensed this, and hesitated.

"You know what else?" he asked with a mischievous grin. He took his cock in his hand and rubbed the head against her clit, keeping well away from the entrance to her pussy. "I know that you'll beg for me if I tease you like this."

Indignantly, though amidst labored breaths, she denied it. "I will not!"

"No? I can wait all night," he promised her, pulling his dick away entirely.

"I don't think you can," she asserted, attempting to capture his elusive manhood by shifting her hips.

"I think I want a sandwich," he declared as he started to push her away and leaned forward to get up.

"Come on, Deeks!" she whined, shoving his shoulders back into the sofa.

"Ha!"

"That wasn't begging," she informed him. "It was the warning right before I kick your ass."

"It's close enough for me," he said, melting into the kiss she had aggressively planted on him.

Truthfully, Kensi was right. Deeks could not have held out much longer. When he finally did guide himself to the sopping wet opening of her pussy, he had to school his face and his breathing to maintain control; his pounding heart he could do nothing about.

With a moan Kensi lowered herself down onto him, engulfing his whole length. She then immediately began to ride him with haste. Deeks hadn't even been able to enjoy the feeling of being buried within her, and already she was chipping away at his composure. He clenched and released his butt each time she sank onto him, lifting his ass off of the couch slightly to meet her.

Soon he was slamming up into her with speed. She leaned back, her breasts dangling just out of reach of his hungry lips. Pausing his thrusts to plant his feet on the coffee table in front of them, he bucked up hard; shifting her whole body forward enough to propel one of her soft mounds into his waiting mouth.

"I know that you like to be on top and in control," he growled against her neck.

Kensi nodded and agreed between her short breaths, "Obviously."

Deeks had snuck his arms around her waist. Quickly he picked her up, her long legs wrapping automatically around his hips. Still deep inside her, he turned and lay her down beneath him on the length of sofa.

She held his face inches from her own as he drove into her with long, rough strokes. She whimpered with each one and looked directly into his smoldering eyes when he told her, "But I know you'll come harder when I can pound you in to the cushions!"

She grasped at his shoulders and eagerly welcomed the enthusiastic kiss he pressed to her lips. He could feel himself tense with restraint. But she felt so good around him, and she was so out of control below him that he wanted to make the sensations last forever.

Her inner muscles had begun to pulse, and she could scarce keep her eyes open. He knew his breathing was no less frantic than hers, but the whimpering moans she let out each time he crashed into her were driving him over the edge.

He ran his hand down her chest and belly, glistening with a thin sheen of sweat. Between harsh breaths he told her, "I know… you'll come, screaming my name… when I do this… in about five seconds."

He pressed his thumb into the nub of flesh above where they were joined. Kensi jerked into him and tightened her arms around his shoulders. Burying her face in his neck she cried out, "God, Deeks! Don't stop!"

Five seconds had passed. Shit, maybe ten. Maybe twenty. He had no idea. But when she finally came, he knew. The occasional twitch of her walls had erupted into a drawn out spasm of trembles. The flow of her release made it easier to move within her despite how tightly she clenched around him. But when she called his name again and bit into his shoulder, he could no longer hold on.

"Kensi!" he growled into her hair, pushing in deep one last time and holding steady. The force of his orgasm caused him to shake and kept him from being able to move. It took all the effort he could manage to keep himself from collapsing on her.

Kensi's hands had migrated down his back, and she massaged his butt as he softened inside her.

"Oh, Kens," he whispered when he finally pulled away and settled at her side.

She hummed and turned into him, then pressed a long kiss to the little scar on his chest. Her free hand rested over the other one on his ribs. The simple action reminded him of the unexpected danger they had faced that day years ago, and the danger they had faced today… and really every day. He shivered and pulled her tighter against him.

Deeks sighed and lifted his head to look at her. She returned his smile and it released a swarm of butterflies in his stomach. She looked content; if her thoughts ran parallel to his, she didn't show it.

"What else do you know about me?" she asked him quietly.

"Kens. Baby. I can barely think right now," he answered, mostly truthfully.

"Heh," she laughed at him, tracing little circles with her fingers on his chest. "Well, I bet it would have been something charming, and profoundly corny."

His smile grew wider and his heart swelled as he answered, "You know me so well."

* * *

 **A/N: 30,000+ words? What? And most of them dirty? Shocker.**

 **Here we go, into the final stretch!… or should it be the final hand? The last deal? What am I writing about again? We're getting down there. Three more chapters planned. And that's it.**

 **As always, thanks for the reviews, faves, follows, etc. They are appreciated.**


	14. Last Bets

**(Chapter 14: Last Bets)**

 **A/N: Gah! This is another one I wasn't going to do. But I've written a chapter for damn near every episode of season 6 to this point. So what the hell.**

 **Set after 6x10 ("Reign Fall"), this is the last business-as-usual chapter for our partners with privileges. After this, they have some final betting to do.**

 **Rating: M… Forever and always, M.**

* * *

It had been a tough day. The kind of tough that forced Deeks to remind himself how much worse it had been as a public defender. But not by a huge margin. Working a case that dealt with sons of an abusive father struck a nerve with him. Having to yell and threaten violence, even if he never intended to act on it, had made him feel sick with himself. Especially since this time he didn't even have the advantage of being able to assure himself that it worked. They had gotten their killer in the end, and saved a few lives in the process. But it was hard for Deeks to feel too satisfied.

"What are you thinking about?" Kensi asked him from the passenger's seat. She had been watching him as he drove in silence for the last several minutes.

"Brisket belly," he lied.

She kept her piercing gaze on him but agreed, "Told you that barbecue place was good."

He smiled and replied, "You've never led me astray before."

Deeks could see out of the corner of his eye that she was fidgeting with her hands. The silence they shared save for the low radio was comfortable. But it was clear that he wasn't the only one lost in thought.

"Still thinking about the case today?" she inquired.

"No. Yeah. Kinda," he eventually decided. "Thinking about my dad. How he was just vicious to me and my mom. How he didn't even have the horrible excuse of trying to push me or make me into a better person. He was just…"

"Cruel?" Kensi offered when Deeks ran out of words.

"Yeah," he agreed quietly. "Look, I haven't really thought in depth about the old bastard in a long time, and I don't want to break that streak today."

"No worries," she assured him. After a brief pause she attempted a change in topic. "So, how come you never mentioned that you're best friends with an NBA all star?"

"I wouldn't say he's my _best_ friend," Deeks corrected.

"Well?"

"Well, you know how it is. He only barely knows what I do," Deeks continued. "You and I may blur the lines between our professional and private lives, but I don't make a habit of it."

Deeks waited to see if she would take the bait and ask him who his best friend was. She didn't, so he continued, "And what's your excuse?"

"My excuse?" she asked defensively.

"Yeah. Got a little crush on _one of_ my good friends?" he asked, looking away from the road for a millisecond to smile at her. "You couldn't even flirt properly around him!"

"Why? You jealous?" she chided him. "Embarrassed to stand around next to a shirtless professional athlete?"

He only laughed immodestly before answering, "You know damn well I got my own game going on."

Deeks swore he could _hear_ Kensi blush before she looked out the window to hide her smile. Regaining her composure she scolded him, "Well you could have still told me about your friend. You know how big of a basketball fan I am."

"And after watching you fan girl in front of him while we were supposed to be working," he reminded her, "I think I made the right choice."

"Speaking of which," she interrupted. "What exactly did you tell him about me?"

"Huh?"

" _Huh?_ " she mimicked him. "He winked at you. He wasn't even subtle about it. He said ' _oh, she bad_ ,' like… five times!"

One hundred percent ignoring the question, Deeks instead answered an earlier one. Clearing his throat he told her, "I never mentioned Kip because honestly, with his training schedule and my job, we don't get to hang out more than a few times a year. Besides, it's not like you've ever introduced me to any of your friends."

"That's fair," he answered him. "You can meet them next time they're in town. Most of my friends are either from college or from my time back east."

"Sounds like a plan," he said, smiling genuinely.

He focused on the last few minutes of their drive back to Kensi's place, but Deeks' mind was working overtime. As with everything in their mystery of a relationship, he wondered about the deeper meaning of her words, and whether this was another step forward or not.

She had been super cuddly with him lately. She had been more receptive to his suggestions that they try each others hobbies. She had been _way_ more likely to blatantly flirt back at him, even while working. She still hand't brought up the subject of their 'extra curricular' activities or where she wanted them to lead… But he knew something was different, maybe better. He just couldn't put his finger on it.

Then he spotted it again. Her finger. The whole month of December she had been fidgeting with the ring finger on her left hand. The realization hit him like a rock. Duh. Her ex fiancé had left her on Christmas all those years ago. He'd only seen her this self conscious about it a few times before. But then, this was her first holiday season since finding out what actually happened to Jack after he disappeared.

He knew he was terrible at talking about these things, so he remained silent. Especially since they had pulled up to the curb in front of Kensi's building. As she scoured behind her for the jacket she had left in his back seat, Deeks took the opportunity to get out and trot around his car so he could open the door for her.

"How gentlemanly of you!" she exclaimed, giving him a quick peck on the cheek. It was only a little, but the contact made his heart soar. It had been a few days since they spent the night together, and she hadn't invited him in. But she did smile at him warmly before telling him, "I'll see you tomorrow, Deeks."

"Hey Kens?" he called out to her as she turned to head up the walk. He paused for a moment while all of the sentiments he still wanted to share rushed through his head. As always, he would love to stay the night, even if only to sleep. But there was one thing he really wanted to do, with no expectations of sex to follow.

Reaching out to her, he put his hands on her waist and took a step closer. Her eyes flashed in surprise, then delight as he pressed a tender kiss to her lips. Just as she started to reciprocate, he broke free and said to her softly, "Good night, Kensi."

He returned to the driver's seat and started his car. Kensi had walked a few steps up her path and had turned to watch his progress. Deeks lingered a moment, looking back at her again before driving away. He smiled most of the drive home. He had kissed her, and not just as a part of their foreplay. And she had let him.

He made it safely home in high spirits and began his solo evening routine: Let the dog out, feed the dog, sort out the recycling, secure his weapon, brush his teeth, let the dog out again, and finally change for bed. He nestled in under his covers and shut off the lights. Not quite tired yet, he perused Facebook on his phone. There wasn't really anything interesting at that time of night. So he ended up looking at some pictures he had taken of himself and Kensi skateboarding some weeks ago.

He kicked himself at how smitten he was when he realized how long he had been flipping through his pictures. Setting the phone down, he pulled up his covers around his bare chest and settled in for what was sure to be a restless night of sleep.

* * *

Monty woke him up extra early the next morning. Deeks had been peacefully asleep, but once he regained consciousness, he became aware that his arm was numb and asleep still, and of how stiff he was; like he hadn't rolled over all night.

His chin, cheek and nose were just a tiny bit damp with slobber, and the dog's fur was tickling his face. Still unwilling to fully open his eyes, he brushed the silky strands away from his eyes. Groaning and rolling over, he reached out both to stretch and to put some distance between himself and his affectionate dog, but encountered only smooth skin.

He didn't really register what was happening until he heard a low giggle. Dogs don't giggle. He snapped his eyes open to encounter a mismatched pair staring back at him; one brown, one hazel, both twinkling in amusement.

"Good morning, sunshine," Kensi said to him softly. Deeks was still confused and his face showed it. He took the sight of his partner in. She was wearing a tank top and he couldn't tell what else, because she was under the covers with him.

"Kensi?" he asked, bewildered.

"Yeah?"

"When did you get here?"

"About an hour ago," she shrugged, chuckling at his confused state.

"What time is it?" he asked groggily.

"Seven in the morning," she told him.

Finally realizing it was her that kissed him, he asked, "You woke me up?"

"You wouldn't wake up on your own," she rationalized.

He shook his head, still not awake enough to be fully aware of what was going on. "What are you doing here?"

"I woke up around four… couldn't get back to sleep," she told him simply. "So I came here and let myself in. I thought you were awake, because you held me when I snuggled up." She sighed, "But you weren't."

"I was dreaming," he guessed, smiling softly at her.

"Anything good?"

"I don't know," he said truthfully.

"Looks like it might have been a good dream," she told him as her hand snuck between them to draw his attention to the bulge he was now painfully aware of, pressing slightly against her thigh. "Nice morning wood, by the way."

He decided not to mention that he had thought his dog had woken him up. But his mouth was soon occupied anyways, as Kensi leaned in to engage his lips.

"You miss me last night?" he asked flirtatiously when she pulled away. His free hand moved to rest on the curve of her hip.

"Mhmm," she considered, shrugging and smiling coyly. "Maybe a little… these last few long winter nights."

"We live in California," he reminded her, grinning and raising his eyebrows.

"The nights are still long," she rationalized, pawing at his chest to emphasize her words.

"And so here you are," he whispered against the hollow of her neck.

"Here I am. And here _you_ are, still talking for some reason," she teased, running her fingers through his hair and rolling him to his back under the sheets.

She had her legs on either side of his hips, and she moaned into his mouth when he rocked his hips up; his erection pressing against her in just the right spot. Deeks was painfully aware of how many layers of clothing still separated them, and he ran his hands up her bare thighs to slip under what he discovered were sleep shorts. His breath caught in his lungs when his probing fingers discovered no more barriers of clothing were in his way. He reached his thumbs towards her center, just barely grazing the outermost skin of her folds.

She sat up all the way, steadying herself with her hands on his chest. Her hair cascaded around her shoulders, and her cheeks were flushed. Deeks' hands continued to massage her inner thighs, but his eyes were fixed on her covered breasts and her pointed nipples poking through her tank top.

Kensi dragged her fingers slowly across each of the well defined muscles on his stomach. Then up her own torso to pull up her top and reveal her toned abdomen. She stopped just shy of where his eyes were transfixed, showing just the tiniest amount of the bottom of the curve of her breasts.

"Kens?" he asked pleadingly, finally snapping out of his trance to meet her amused gaze.

"Have I caught you staring, Deeks?" she asked him chidingly, continuing to keep her breasts hidden from him.

"Are you kidding me? It's taken all of my effort to not stare at you all day every day, ever since we started doing this. Possibly even before… Maybe… Definitely," he answered, hooking a finger under the waist band of her shorts and revealing another inch of skin. "Knowing exactly what's under your clothes. I'm surprised you haven't caught me sooner!"

His hands chased after hers, sliding up the sides of her waist and encouraging her to finish peeling off her tank top. When she finally did, Deeks mouth dropped open like it did every time, no matter how many times he'd seen her like this.

Sexier than Kensi's half naked body on top of his, was the look she was giving him. It was equal parts lustful, tender, and mischievous as she threw off the sheets and let her hand rummage around in his boxers.

Deeks groaned loudly when her long fingers wrapped around what she had been looking for. She freed him from his underwear and found that he was plenty hard enough. Still, she seemed keen on teasing him. Looking him square in the eye and smiling lasciviously, she fondled each of his balls, ran her fingers up along a vein just below the soft skin of his shaft, and rubbed her thumb around the sensitive slit on the tip of his head. None of those things would have been particularly erogenous under normal circumstances. But Deeks was on a hair pin trigger after several nights alone.

Keeping a grip on him, she slipped a hand beneath the waistband of her tiny shorts. When Deeks saw her intentions, he roughly pulled down the elastic and shifted her body forward so she could shimmy the shorts down her legs. When she'd kicked them off, he continued to pull her up over his body by the back of her thighs until she was above his head. Kensi braced herself on the headboard while she lowered her open hips to his face.

Deeks had never done it quite like this before, and quickly found that he had to hold her thighs in place. Or else, she would writhe away from his touch, overstimulated by his aggressive lips and the tickling brush of his scruff. Soon enough though, she had acclimated to the wet pressure from his tongue and gyrated her pelvis in time with his movements, somewhat forcing his head down into his pillows.

After several minutes, he was fairly certain that she was close. His suspicions were confirmed when she whimpered and reflexively tried to pull away from him again. Keeping both hands on her hips as best he could, he snuck one closer to the flushed bundle of nerves just above his nose and pressed down on it in little circles.

"Oh, Fuck! Deeks!" she cried, gripping the headboard with white knuckles. He moved his hand around her waist to instead press his thumb into her sopping core, while his lips sucked on her clit. Kensi moaned with each breath and then finally called out again, "Oh! Fuck, yeah!"

She sat back fully on his chest and bent over backwards, sprawling her long torso along the length of his abdomen and thighs. Deeks could have been patient enough to let her come down for a few minutes, but she was laying on his dick in a very uncomfortable way.

Taking her hands in his, he tugged her back into an upright position. She shifted her hips down until they straddled his, and pressed her breasts against his chest. Deeks managed to slide his boxers further down his thighs with one hand, while the other cupped her face as she kissed him sloppily.

He didn't even need to guide his nearly throbbing cock to her entrance. She had positioned her hips precisely above him, and was so wet and ready for him that he just slid right in. She sunk down on him completely in one fluid motion, making him groan with how soft and hot she was around him.

As he began to move his hips up and down, causing her to rock above him, he was struck again with how incredibly lucky he was to be here with her; with what little thought he was capable of devoting to anything other than the building pressure in his dick.

Deeks forced his eyes to stay open so he could take in the sight of the woman on top of him. The way the muscles of her shoulders tensed as she held herself steady on him; the way her round breasts flattened against his chest; the way her flowing hair framed her face and tickled his neck; and most beautifully, the way she bit her lip and scrunched her eyes shut as she rode him towards a second or maybe third climax… he honestly couldn't tell, because she was still pulsating around him, and it was driving him crazy trying to keep from joining her in his blissful release.

He stilled his movements, trying his hardest to maintain control. But she tested his limits as she rocked her hips back and forth, fueling that sweet burn with their friction. He no longer had any choice in the matter. As she clenched around him, he squeezed harder with the arm wrapped around her waist. Every muscle in his body tensed for a moment before the strength of his orgasm caused him to shake.

Deeks weakly pushed up into her for a few moments more; depleted but addicted to the feeling of her still fluttering muscles pulling on his sensitive flesh. Kensi lay her head on his shoulder and turned his face with her palm so she could press a gentle kiss to his lips. Their tongues dueled for several seconds before the need for air forced them to separate and catch their breath.

At some point in the next few minutes, Kensi had moved off of him and lay pressed against his side. He still had an arm around her, and one of her long legs was thrown across his lower body. Deeks was fighting sleep hard, and blinked a couple of times when he caught sight of the clock on his night stand. It read 7:59 AM.

"Shit! We're gonna be late!" he exclaimed, springing from the bed and clumsily untangling himself from Kensi's arms and his sheets. He tripped and fell to the floor with a thud when he tried to walk with his boxers still around his knees.

Kensi tried and failed to suppress a genuine laugh at her dorky partner. Still chuckling, she told him, "Deeks, we don't have work today."

He looked up at her from the floor and took a moment to verify this in his mind. "And you woke me up?" he asked accusingly. "At seven in the morning?"

"Would you have preferred that I didn't?" she inquired, stretching out under the rumpled sheets.

Deeks climbed back to his feet and shed the restrictive garment around his ankles. He pretended to think about her question before joining her on the bed again. "No… But I know a way you can make it up to me."

"I think I can guess," she said, wrapping her arms around his shoulders when he crawled in next to her.

He whispered his cocky reply a few inches from her face. "I doubt it."

Cocking her head to the side, she guessed, "Does it have to do with me making you—"

"Pancakes?" he cut her off. "Yes! Exactly that."

She laughed and allowed herself to be rolled to her back. "I'd bet that what I was going to suggest would be just as messy, but more enjoyable for both of us."

"But now all I can think about is pancakes!" he lied, running his tongue along the hollow of her neck.

"Here," she said, reaching between them to feel how ready for another round he already was. "Let me fix that for you."

* * *

 **A/N: Many of you have said that they don't want this story to end. Confession: I don't want this story to end either. It's not holding me back from finishing the last chapters (busy life is doing that just fine on it's own), it's just making me want to add another chapter to the end… and maybe a couple earlier ones.**

 **Update: So I did. If you care, this is where I went out of order and snuck in chapters 2 & 3 which have since been moved to where they belong. Now back to your regularly scheduled programming.**


	15. All In

**(Chapter 15: All In)**

 **A/N: Continuing on with the late act of our story…**

 **This is the chapter that started it all (plus part of the last)… before I decided to go back and write a few, which turned into 14 preceding chapters to outline the relationship they had leading up to this point. Can you imagine trying to explain all of that in a few exposition paragraphs? No. It's much better off now the way it is.**

 **As the chapter title may have given away, this one is tagged to 6x11 ("Humbug").**

 **Rating: Wouldn't it be funny if this were the only chapter** ** _not_** **rated M? Well, it's not funny… because it** ** _is_** **rated M.**

* * *

Kensi rifled through her underwear drawer. It occurred to her that it was ridiculous how many pairs of underwear she had. Though given how infrequently she did laundry, perhaps it was a necessity when she really thought about it. It was also a little absurd that she was spending so much time picking out her best, sexiest underwear, given how little she planned on wearing them during her impending trip to Mammoth with her boyfriend. Her _boyfriend_.

She felt a flutter in her heart at the thought of that stupid word. It hardly seemed an apt description of the depth of their devotion to each other. But in the few hours since making their relationship official, since agreeing to go all in for what would hopefully be the long haul, she had to admit that it was nice to have some simple word to use.

She tossed a few lacier pairs of panties towards the duffle bag on her bed haphazardly. Then she remembered there was a slight chance they might actually go snow boarding, and threw in a few more sporty pairs for good measure.

She bounced around her room in as good a mood as she'd been in for, well… years, maybe. Though there was no one there to see it, she couldn't wipe the smile from her face. Why had she been so nervous to tell him how she felt? Why had she been concerned that she might have waited too long? She knew he still wanted more from her. He had even baited her earlier in the day when he drew attention to Joelle's inability to tell Callen how she felt. She couldn't say for sure how she missed all of this, and she chided herself for it now. Especially after Deeks had so readily jumped at her suggestion that they call their relationship what it really was and ' _be bold_ ' together.

The anxiety she had let build up all day while she was working up the courage to talk to him had now been replaced with giddiness. She felt like a teenage girl getting ready for the prom; or perhaps more appropriately, like her younger self heading to her first day of NCIS agent training at FLETC. Only, she never remembered feeling so hot and bothered at the academy.

She slipped out of her jeans, intending to change into a pair of panties a little more suitable for what she had planned that night in whatever ski lodge Deeks was bringing them to. Before she could get much further, she heard the clicking of someone keying her front door and opening it. Despite being ninety-nine percent sure it was just Deeks, she crept into her hallway ready to fight off an intruder in her underwear.

"Deeks!" Kensi shouted, still somewhat startled that her boyfriend of only hours had let himself into her place as she packed. "You're like, an hour early!"

"I know," he replied sheepishly, smiling and wetting his lips as his gaze wandered over her bare legs.

She had stepped into her living room to greet him more properly, opening her arms to his embrace as he walked quickly to her. But she was not prepared for the force with which he brought his lips to hers. Nor the strength he used to push her firmly against the wall.

She grunted as her back pressed into the wall with a soft thud. But her lips stayed locked with his and her hands ran from his shoulders up to tangle in his hair, scratching lightly at the back of his head. Her tongue invaded his mouth, and he still tasted of the peppermint cocoa she had bought for him at the ice skating rink; a ruse to steal another moment alone and out of their teammate's eyes after they had initially slipped up and displayed their affection out on the ice.

"Deeks!" she moaned, breaking their kiss to meet his darkened blue eyes. "I'm not ready yet!"

He had dropped a hand from her hip to probe between her legs and beneath her panties. Upon discovering the growing wetness already there he remarked, "Could have fooled me!"

After gasping at his touch, she smiled and playfully bit at his upper lips. "I meant I'm not packed yet! I'm not ready to leave—"

He cut her off with another kiss, breathing her scent in sharply through his nose. His face was so close to hers that she could barely see him smile as he told her, "Wouldn't bother me if you didn't bring any clothes."

"Mhhmm, you're not thinking that through," she told him, pushing his jacket off of his shoulders.

"I'm not thinking about much of anything at the moment," he admitted. "Except how badly I need you right now."

"You can't wait until we get to Mammoth later tonight?" she asked, even as her hands undid his belt buckle and unzipped his jeans. He was already stiff in her hands when she pulled out his dick.

"That's a five hour trip!" he exclaimed softly, continuing to rub at the nubbin between her folds. "Even with your driving."

Kensi had started to think of a witty retort about not ever wanting to drive his truck, but immediately forgot everything else in the world. He had lifted one of her legs, pulled aside her panties, and was pushing his impressively hard cock into her tight heat. She gasped and wrapped her arms tighter around his shoulders so she could lift her other leg and curl them both around his hips.

Deeks held her up against the wall, rocking in and out of her in strained motions. The intense friction from his hard thrusts completely distracted Kensi from the ache that was starting to form in her back. And she had a new appreciation for what it meant to go crazy from being literally driven up the wall.

She knew that was a pun he would appreciate, but he kept her lips captive with his own amidst labored grunts. He managed to stay inside her as he hiked her up higher around his hips, and pulled away from the support of the wall. She instinctively tightened her hold on him and reveled in how deep he was as he took a few careful steps towards her bedroom; the effort of holding her entire weight and walking with his pants on his thighs was slowing him down.

"What the…?" he exclaimed in disappointment when he discovered that her bed was completely occupied with unpacked clothing and toiletries scattered around her mostly empty travel bag.

Not taking her eyes off of him to see what he was talking about, she guessed and answered, "I told you I was still packing!"

Deeks abruptly changed directions and returned to the living room.

"Gah!" he shouted when he saw his options were still limited. Her kitchen counter had dishes on it. The small dining table had what appeared to be a pair of boots being retrofitted to conceal a knife in the sole. And the couch… "Is that your sniper rifle in a case on your couch?"

"No," she assured him, gyrating her hips to keep her sweet burn kindled. "Mine is locked safely in the armory. That one's my dad's."

"Kensi, I _can't_ _even_ right now!" he said, exasperation evident in his voice.

Fatigue setting in on him, he returned down the hallway and ended up in her bathroom. He groaned when she dropped back on the vanity counter and he slipped out of her. Kensi took it as an opportunity to stand and rid herself of her underwear, and Deeks dropped his pants to his ankles, leaving them trapped on his legs by his shoes. He peeled his shirt off though, before grabbing Kensi by the hips and pulling her in for a deep, languid kiss.

He moved to lift her up by the thighs again, but she pushed his hands away. Instead, she turned around and bent forward over her sink. He met the reflection of her dark eyes in the mirror, and nestled the head of his slick cock into her entrance again, his breath catching in his chest as she pushed back on him a little.

She was keeping her legs almost shut together, and she knew what it must feel like for him as he slowly entered her again, because it felt divine to her as well. He ran his hands up the ridge of her still clothed spine and moved in long, slow strokes. She could see the restraint evident in his reflection in the mirror, and when he opened his eyes again, he focused on pushing up her shirt to reveal more of her tanned skin.

Before she could pull it off, he had managed to unclasp her bra. She stood up straight and he helped her shed the last of her clothing, pulling her back against his bare chest. His arms wrapped around her waist and his hands massaged her breasts tenderly.

She desperately wanted him to move faster, but the angle they were at was somewhat restrictive. Bending forward again, she lifted a bent leg and tucked it up on the counter. Deeks widened his stance as well and braced his arms on her hips as he started to slam into her with speed.

Deeks leaned forward over her and sucked on the skin at her shoulder. Kensi was lost to the sensations of his cock sliding all the way out and pushing in deeply over and over again. She barely even noticed that he had turned the cold water tap on a tiny bit, and honestly didn't wonder why.

Her eyes snapped open when his fingers, coated in icy water, found her clit. The contrast with the heat she was radiating and the cold of his touch was unlike anything she had ever experienced. It only took a few seconds more of him rubbing at her bundle of nerves from the front and pounding into her from behind before she arched into him and cried out in ecstasy; unable to form intelligible words.

Her knees were weak, and she was only still standing because Deeks was holding her torso so tightly against his chest. He must have sensed the extra weight he was holding up, because he slowed his movements and turned her in his arms.

Gently, he helped Kensi turn and sit on the counter again, and touched his forehead to hers before kissing her sweetly. His lips danced with hers in a slow rhythm while his hands helped guide his dick into position again. Kensi reached down to stroke him gently a few times, feeling how his hot skin was practically throbbing.

But he didn't push into her. Instead he kissed his way down her neck, chest and belly. He dropped to his knees on her bathroom tile and brought his flushed lips to her clit, still chilled from the water. He held his tongue motionless against her swollen nub as he sucked on her gently, pressing against it in response to each time an aftershock pulsed through her.

Kensi was starting to register the discomfort of sitting on the edge of her sink, and tugged impatiently on his hair. "Deeks! Come on, babe."

Running his tongue up and down her slit one last time, he stood, smiling. With no more delay, he filled her completely again, and they moaned in unison. Kensi held her arms around his neck, but as the pressure began to build within her again, she dropped her hands to the counter top to steady herself.

Deeks had his hands on both of her legs to help pull her to him each time he rammed into her. His movements had become frantic and his breathing erratic. His eyes were wild when he could bring himself to open them, and Kensi couldn't shift her gaze from them.

"Let go, Deeks!" she told him. "I'm _so_ close!"

He regained control of his movements enough to make sure his last several strokes were as long as they could be without slipping out. Feeling the full length of him again was sufficient to trigger another wave of pleasure as her entire body trembled along with the fluttering of her inner muscles.

Deeks could have maybe lasted a few more seconds, but feeling her pulse around him was all it took to make him come. "Kensi!… Kens," he growled between two or three labored breaths. "Oh, Kens."

She didn't know where he got the strength from, but picking her up by her hips again, and still sheathed within her, he took a few steps back from the vanity. When his back hit the bathroom wall, he slid slowly down to the floor.

She kissed him softly for a minute or two, letting her hands explore his body now that they were finally unoccupied and free to do so. His muscles were bulging from exertion, and each time he shifted an arm, a cord rippled across his chest and shoulder.

"Since we're already in the bathroom, you wanna hop in the shower?" she asked him.

"Don't bother," he answered, still showing no signs of being able or ready to move. "Just throw some sweat pants on and let's hit the road."

"You don't want to be clean to start the trip off?" she asked, nuzzling his face with her nose.

"Meh," he shrugged. "It's just my truck we're riding in. And there's a jacuzzi bath tub for two in our cabin."

"Well then," she told him in barely a whisper, "we'd best get moving."

* * *

 **A/N: Oh, that's right. I decided that there's a jacuzzi tub in their cabin. I might have to do something with that… If only to give myself an excuse to squeeze in another chapter before the last.**


	16. The Showdown

**(Chapter 16: The Showdown)**

 **A/N: I did it, okay? I wrote the damn jacuzzi chapter. Consider this as the first part of the epilogue that also takes place post 6x11 ("Humbug"), and later in the evening after the previous chapter.**

 **Rating: I'm not sure there's much in this chapter that isn't M.**

* * *

"Told you we'd make great time," Deeks bragged in a low, cocky tone.

"We could have been here quicker," Kensi reminded him, unable to see the grin on his face as she sat with between his legs with her back against his bare chest. "If we'd left when we were supposed to."

"But, if we hadn't taken the time to dilly-dally back at you're place—"

"Dilly-dally?" she interrupted him to ask teasingly, splashing the warm water in the tub slightly as she pet the arm he had wrapped around her waist.

"—I would have had no choice but to tear your clothes off the second we busted through this door," he told her.

"You basically did."

"Fair. _But,"_ he started, lifting a hand out from under the water to emphasize his point, "we at least took the time to bring our bags in and such while this mammoth tub filled up."

"Hmmm," she agreed, nestling back further against his chest.

"See what I did there? ' _Mammoth_ tub?'" he asked, quite pleased with himself.

"I see that you're a doofus," she chuckled, stretching out one of her long legs until her toes poked through from beneath the peaks of bath bubbles.

"And yet, here you are. With me," he said in a voice as low as a whisper against her cheek.

"Here I am, with you," she agreed, nuzzling her cheek against his lips when he kissed her softly.

Deeks held her a little tighter and sighed contentedly, breathing in the sweet, flowery smell of the soap and the scented candles burning in the dimly lit bathroom. The rectangular whirlpool tub they shared was quite spacious; large enough that they could have each sprawled out on opposite ends with only their legs touching. But instead they both occupied the same corner, satisfied only when they were as near to each other as they could be.

Despite how long it seemed they had been building towards this, Deeks still could not believe that they were finally together. It seemed absurd, really, given how long they had been sleeping together; how long they had been effectively in a romantic relationship even if it wasn't official until only a few hours ago.

As exhausted as his mind was from the day, his body was still plenty awake, albeit extremely relaxed. The hot water and the feel of his girlfriend's soft form in his arms these past few minutes had stirred him, and his dick had started to puff up expectantly. Kensi had situated herself carefully between his legs so as not to crush his manhood, but there was no way she couldn't feel it pressing against her butt as it grew impatiently.

As if on cue, Kensi entwined the fingers of her hand with one of his and slowly began to guide him to her breasts. The soft pecks he had been planting on her neck evolved into more substantial kisses as he opened his mouth to taste her skin. Kensi let out a soft moan as their joined hands massaged her breasts. She tilted her head back to let him kiss his way to the corner of her jaw, before turning her head to face him and bringing her lips to his.

For several long moments he kissed her languidly. When he pulled away, it was so he could see her whole face as he smiled at her warmly.

"This really is the perfect way to spend a vacation," she told him, relaxing further into his embrace.

"A candle lit bubble bath?" he specified with curiosity. "It's not too, I don't know… cliché?"

"Hmmm. Maybe a little," Kensi admitted. "But I like it anyways."

"And all this time, Badass Blye's been a romantic," Deeks teased, pulling his free hand from below the water to tuck away a strand of dark hair that had escaped from her loose bun. Water from his fingers ran down her neck to her chest, and he followed its progress with his eyes before meeting hers again. Grinning, he added, "I knew you had a lacy, lady side. But this?"

"Shut up, Deeks," she chuckled, not bothering to deny it.

Kensi reached across her body with her unoccupied hand to cup his cheek, plopping a clump of bubbles on his neck as she did so. She pulled his face towards hers even as Deeks kept her back pressed firmly to his chest. Their other hands were still joined, and as one, he pushed them down her torso until they reached their destination between her legs. She bent her knees more so she could open her legs further for him, and with the added space, Deeks used all five of his digits to explore and tickle the hills and valleys, the creases and folds of her expectant skin. She moaned into his kisses, and Deeks took delight in the knowledge that he was teasing her; his touches were close, but not quite where she wanted them; where she _needed_ them.

Two of Deeks' fingers broke from hers and made their way a bit deeper inside of her, teasing the entrance to her pussy with the tips of his two forefingers. She moaned into his mouth and her now free hand moved a few inches above his to rub her clit herself. Deeks brought his other hand down to push hers out of the way. There was no way he was going to let her have to do this herself when he took such pleasure in making her come. With the fingers of one hand stroking slowly inside of her and the other rubbing in tandem at her clit, Deeks only lamented that he didn't have more hands with which to massage and feel the rest of her body. Kensi was still kneading her own breasts and gripping one of his forearms, unable to reach any interesting parts of his body from where she sat.

Deeks was just starting to wonder if being submerged in warm water was somehow dulling the sensations, when she finally started to really react to what he was doing. In a flash, her soft moans turned to harsh breathing and she began to squirm at his touch; sometimes bucking against his fingers, sometimes writhing away. Her one hand continued to hold his forearm in place, while her other reached back to toy with his now damp hair as he kissed and gently nibbled on her heck.

He could tell the moment she started to come; her body tensed and pushed back against his seconds before he could feel her start to pulse around his fingers. After her twitching inner muscles began to slow down, her body relaxed and she melted back into his embrace completely.

"Oh, Deeks," she sighed.

"Yes, Kensi?"

"Hmmmm. I could sleep now," she admitted in a quiet, sated voice.

"Here in the tub? That seems like a bad idea. Maybe we should move to the bed?" he suggested.

"We will. But not just yet," she told him before shifting forward enough that she could reach behind her better.

She quickly grasped what she was looking for, and turned to smile at him mischievously when she found him to be already hard and ready to go. She stroked his length a few times before rubbing his tip with her thumb, and it was his turn to let out a low groan. His cock twitched in her hand at her expert touch, and Deeks could no longer try to ignore the throbbing desire he felt to be inside her in that instant.

Kensi pushed against his knees to lift herself up, while he moved his hands to her hips to guide her back onto his lap. Her legs were pressed firmly together, and it took him several seconds to maneuver to the tight opening of her pussy. If he hadn't already been able to tell the instant he pushed into her, Kensi's cry of ecstasy as he slowly squeezed inside would have informed him that he found the right spot.

She leaned back against him and he pushed his hips up until he was all the way inside. Slowly, the pair started to rock back and forth. The water from the bath rinsed away some of her natural lubrication, and added to the friction between them. And with how tightly he was wedged between her legs, he had to be careful not to slip out. But even as gently as they were moving, they were already making waves in the tub.

The slow pace was torturous to Deeks; he could hardly keep it together with how superb she felt around him. And he could no longer resist the urge to really slam into her. He started to shift down into the tub more, and encouraged Kensi to spread her legs a bit. She caught on, and leaned forward so she could bend her legs under and straddle him on her knees.

Deeks tried to thrust up into her with a little more speed but encountered two problems; one, he splashed quite a bit of water around, and two, he had difficulty getting traction. After less than a minute, he slipped further down the tub and Kensi fell back on top of him, completely submerging him in the fading bath bubbles.

Kensi climbed off of him and when he resurfaced, the pair faced each other and laughed at their own clumsiness.

"This whole tub thing is harder than I thought it would be," Deeks admitted.

"Here," she replied, reaching for a couple of towels. She put one on the edge of the tub and sat on it, leaning back over the spacious ledge and against the wall. The other, she dropped in the water between her feet. "Try this."

Deeks crawled over to her on his knees and knelt between her legs on the towel. He brought his almost pruned hands to her hips, and she put her arms around his shoulders as he leaned in to give her a long, hungry kiss.

"It's a lot colder out of the water," she complained to him, pressing her body against him to emphasize her point.

"We can definitely do something about that," he replied in a low voice as he used his hand to guide his cock back to pussy.

No longer hindered by their position, Deeks gripped her thighs a little tighter and finally started to thrust with speed. He still splashed plenty, but the pressure in his dick and balls had reached such a critical mass that he could no longer care about anything other than the woman he was making love to, and ensuring that it was as amazing for her as it always was for him. The enthusiasm with which she responded as she wrapped her arms and legs around him only spurred him on.

Deeks knew that he wouldn't last much longer. But just as he was about to reach between them to help her along, he felt her fingers dig into his skin and heard her voice change and her breathing quicken; all tell-tale signs that she was close. She was rocking her hips forward against his and he needed both his hands to hold onto her legs and keep her on the edge of the bath.

With practiced precision, he shifted his strokes in a way that he knew would hit her in just the right spot. Keeping up his pace, he focused his effort of making each of these last several drives long, and powerful. The very second her inner walls started to convulse around him, she pulled him with her and he lost it. He felt his dick start to throb more powerfully and he cried out Kensi's name with his final thrust, swept up in the dual sensations of coming inside of her as she came around him.

Kensi continued to cling to him as he sat back on his haunches and then shifted to his butt, falling back into the tub. He was still inside of her as he reached over to the tap behind her, and she moaned again when he turned on the hot water to replenish the tub. Comfortably submerged in the warm water again, the pair simply held each other contentedly. After several minutes of silence, it was Kensi who spoke.

"We should get up and wash off," she suggested.

Deeks' reply came out muffled against her neck. He mock whined, "I don't wanna!"

"But if we stay here," she reminded him in a suggestive tone, "we'll never make it to the bed."

"Hmm. You make a fair point," he conceded. "But I'm trapped. You'll have to get up first."

After a couple more minutes of laying there, tangled in each other's limbs, Deeks began to wonder if Kensi actually had any intention of moving at all. But as the water cooled and their bodies stiffened, she finally managed to pull herself free of him and gingerly climb out of the tub. He followed her somewhat lethargically to the nearby walk-in shower where they spent a few minutes washing off and exploring each other's bodies with their hands again. If Kensi hadn't shut off the water when she did, Deeks was fairly certain he would have gone for another round right then.

Kensi had managed to keep her hair dry, but Deeks needed to towel off some more. When he left the bathroom after her, he found her bent over in front of the little fireplace, sparking a flame.

"Doing that naked, huh? I guess someone likes to… play with fire," he called out to her in his best bad-pun voice.

He could practically hear her roll her eyes from across the cabin. "You would have preferred me to get dressed?" she asked.

"There's no need for that," he assured her.

He turned off the remaining lights and made his way to the bed against the far wall. It was snowing gently outside their windows, and Deeks would have been able to see the snow-covered peaks if he had been willing to tear his eyes away from his girlfriend for even a second. They crawled under the covers and failed spectacularly at making use of the king-sized space available to them, preferring to be as close to each other as possible.

Deeks was fighting sleep hard. But he didn't want this perfect moment to end. Kensi laid across his chest, and was drawing little circles on one of his pecs with the tips of her fingers. He twirled her hair in his fingers idly and tried to work up the courage to lay it all out for her and tell her that he loved her. He was fairly certain she already knew, but it needed to be said none the less.

"Kens?" he asked.

"Hmmm," she hummed, lifting her head to smile at him. "You ready for round two?"

Actually, he was. "You mean three?"

"I don't count this afternoon. It seems ages ago already," she told him, shifting her torso on top of his so her breasts pressed against his chest.

"I know what you mean," he agreed. "But in a good way. Like, if this could all last forever, I wouldn't complain."

She kept smiling at him, and kissed him on the lips in response. Kensi snuck a knee between his, and Deeks was becoming increasingly aware of his stiffening shaft, now pressed against her thighs. His declaration would have to wait. In the mean time, there were other ways he could show her how much he loved her.

* * *

 **A/N: Looking towards the future, I've already started working on a few more stories... Though none as long as this one. The last chapter (*sigh*), and the second half of the two-shot this whole thing was originally supposed to be, will be out soon enough. Thank you all for sticking with this.**


	17. Splitting the Pot

**(Chapter 17: Splitting the Pot)**

 **A/N: LAST CHAPTER! Woo! I made it. And so did you. How many words? Forty-eight thousand some? Too many… and most of them dirty.**

 **I've reworked this chapter like… 3 times now. This is easily the longest chapter by quite some margin. And brace yourselves, the corn factor is high in this one.**

 **Anything resembling a plot ended some time ago. This is just a little closure, and one last chance to have some fun with these two in this story, before I move on to other ideas bouncing around in my head.**

 **Rating: Wait… "M" stands for Mature? Why didn't anyone tell me? No one has ever accused anything I've ever done in my life of being "mature." So much for that streak.**

* * *

"Aren't we going to swing through town and pick Monty up from the kennel? We've been on the mountain all day, he probably misses us," Kensi asked Deeks as he drove his truck right on by the road that led into the heart of the tourist village of Mammoth Lakes. They instead continued on their drive from the restaurant to the lodge where they'd rented a small cabin just outside of town.

"He loves that place. So many new friends to sniff, he doesn't miss us at all. Besides, he's paid up through tomorrow," Deeks explained.

"Why did you kennel him in the first place?" she added. "Didn't want to leave him alone all day in a strange place?"

"I wasn't sure how long we'd be out," he shrugged. Reaching over to the passenger's seat to blindly grasp for her hand, he continued, "We'll get him tomorrow, but for now I've got something special planned for our first time now that we're officially together."

"Deeks, we had sex yesterday," she reminded him, grinning.

"Yeah?"

Holding up two fingers, she indicated, "Twice."

"Actually, three times," he chuckled, winking.

"And again this morning."

"We did," he agreed. Nodding his head, he elaborated, "I was there. It was awesome."

"So… you have something special planned for our _fifth_ time, now that we're officially together?" she clarified, squeezing his hand while she teased him.

"Kens. Can you just—?" he asked exasperatedly, giving her a sideways glance and a grin.

" _You_ were the one who just couldn't wait and _had_ to take me against my living room wall," she told him. Quickly adding, "Not that I'm complaining, or anything."

"Hmmmh. Yeah," he admitted sheepishly.

"And in the tub last night," she continued.

"That was nice."

"Then again, in bed before we went to sleep," she added.

"Had to test it out," he reasoned.

"And again this morning," she finished. "I'm actually surprised we left the cabin at all today, at the rate you were going."

"No regrets," Deeks assured her. "Fine. Then as a celebration for officially making it twenty-four hours."

"Oh, geez," she teased. "So long as we don't become that couple that celebrates the anniversaries of literally every little event."

"No promises," he joked. "But I think you'll like what I have planned."

"I can't wait to see what it is," she responded genuinely with a soft smile.

He had pulled the truck up to the third small cabin in this row; an upgrade from the room in the lodge hotel he had originally suggested. Nestled in the trees, it had a view of the snowy peaks but was fairly private from the neighboring buildings. Deeks could see through the low light of dusk that the porch light had been left on, there were fresh tire tracks in the snow, and smoke wafted up from the chimney. So he was certain the lodge staff had honored his request at the time he had prearranged. But even he wasn't prepared to see what all they had done.

Deeks pranced up the stairs to unlock the door and hold it open for his girlfriend. But before he opened the door, he kissed her for easily the hundredth time that day. In the last twenty-four hours, he simply couldn't get over the novelty of finally being able to do so whenever he wanted. Releasing her from his embrace, he pushed the door open. When Kensi stepped through the threshold, she gasped audibly. Deeks also had to pause to take in the sight of the perfectly decorated cabin.

Lit candles twinkled from the kitchenette, the coffee table, the window sills, the ledge above the whirlpool bathtub and on the mantle place above the cozily crackling fire. The sink held a bucket of ice that housed a bottle of pink champagne, two elegant glass flutes sat out on the counter next to it. A bowl of strawberries and chocolates flanked the other side of the sink.

"Oh, my God. Deeks! This is gorgeous," Kensi said in raptures, heading straight for the dish of chocolates. "How did you—?"

"I _may_ have told the lodge staff that this was our fourth wedding anniversary," he admitted, grinning slyly.

"What? Ha!" Kensi laughed at him, clearly amused at the thought. "One step at a time, there, lover boy. I could barely tolerate you four years ago."

"To be fair, I'm ninety percent certain it actually is the fourth anniversary of the aliases I booked this under. And you liked me a little," he persuaded her, taking the strawberry she offered him and sinking his teeth into the juicy fruit.

"Hmmm," she squinted and pretended to consider him. Narrowing her eyes and grinning widely, she admitted, "A little. I thought you had a nice ass."

"That's as good a place to start as any," he agreed wholeheartedly. "But come on, you liked my charm too."

"Oh, you had charisma in spades," she sarcastically agreed. "Or hearts, if you will."

Deeks was beaming at her, unable to take his eyes off of her. "And look at us now."

"Who'da thunk? Huh?" she asked him as she uncoiled the wire on the champaign bottle cork, and expertly popped it open.

Kensi had her attention on pouring the bubbly drink in the two glasses. Deeks looked down shyly at her words and it occurred to him that he had definitely thought about it— about them, most of these past five-ish years. A lot. But he had never let himself believe they'd ever get to this point.

Taking the glass she offered him, he clinked it with hers and drank deeply before saying to her seriously, "Kens, I really want to tell you something—"

"Wait just a moment," she told him, setting her glass down and softly pushing a finger to his lips. "Let me change out of these snow boarding clothes."

"Okay," he agreed.

He wondered if she could sense what he had been about to say, and was trying to distract him or postpone his declaration. He decided to play it by ear, and after she had grabbed a few scraps of clothing from her bag and scurried into the bathroom, he took the opportunity to slip into something more… _comfortable_ as well.

It hadn't taken him long to change into the single article of what he generously thought of as clothing, but his mostly bare skin was now feeling a little chilled. When Kensi emerged from behind the closed door, all thoughts of how cold he was were banished.

She had let her hair down from the braids she had kept it in all day, and it fell in tight waves to her shoulders. His eyes wandered up her long, bare legs to the black lace panties and matching bra that were both just barely visible underneath a familiar, loosely buttoned grey blouse.

"Hey, I recognize that shirt," he said, stepping towards her slowly.

Kensi didn't answer immediately. Her eyes were fixed on his groin. Her eyebrows were raised and she was suppressing a smile. Finally she tore her gaze away, blinked several times and answered, "What?"

"The shirt you're wearing," Deeks motioned at her torso. "I thought I asked you to burn it?"

"Guess I never got the chance," she replied grinning, having recollected her wits. Motioning to his 'underwear' she asked, "What is _that_?"

"Oh, you like this?" he said, looking down at the blue banana hammock with a strategically placed yellow smiley face. "It's just a little something— or rather a big— a _very_ big something I have left over from my college days."

"This is your idea of making this special?" she asked him, smiling and shaking her head. "You just can't help yourself can you?"

"I really can't," he admitted. "Did you actually expect me to take this seriously?"

With a lascivious grin, she ran a single finger up the centerline of his bare chest. "Does this mean I get a dance, Magic Marty?"

"Someday, absolutely," he promised her. The way her eyes roamed his body hungrily sent a jolt through his heart and lower gut. He could see her cleavage peaking out from beneath her shirt, and the way she was tickling his chest made his skin tighten and his hairs stand erect. Another part of him was quickly standing erect as well.

His breath hitched and he put his hands on her waist as he continued, "But I'm already mostly naked. It would take away the fun of a striptease. And at the moment, this is actually getting very tight, very quickly."

"We should probably do something about that," she offered helpfully. She dropped her hands to the muscles that jutted out above his hips, while he ran his fingers through her long, dark hair. Cupping her face in his hands, he brought it closer to his.

Looking adoringly into her eyes, each twinkling with the reflection of both the fire behind him and her fire within, he spoke against her lips, "My thoughts exactly."

As their kisses deepened and their hands wandered more aggressively, Deeks had to resist the urge to rip her clothing off of her. She had taken the time to pick out and wear this set of lingerie for him, so he was going to show his appreciation. He undid the only button holding her blouse together and slipped the shirt off of her shoulders.

Before he could toss it aside she warned him, "Don't you dare throw that in the fire!"

"Wouldn't dream of it," he assured her.

She pulled on his hands and guided him to the couch in front of the fire place. He sat down on the fleece blanket, and she settled on his lap. Holding her in his arms, he nibbled at her neck and caressed her chest with his lips. She toyed with his hair while he nudged at the edge of the lace with his nose, breathing in the scent of her skin and trying to ignore his impatient dick as it made its presence known to him.

She stole another earth shattering kiss from him before inquiring, "What was it you wanted to tell me? I want to know."

He tightened his hold on her and asked her, "You do?"

She only nodded in confirmation.

Deeks took a deep breath in his nose and blew it out his mouth. His eyes were held captive by her gaze as he finally confessed, "I love you, Kensi. You are so badass, so intelligent, unbelievably gorgeous, and hilarious… in your own way. You are everything I could ever hope for, and so much more than I deserve. And I intend to work hard every day to be worthy of you, for as long as you'll have me."

"Deeks," she sighed, brushing the hair from his brow. "You're too hard on yourself. You deserve to be happy. You've fought it for so long."

She closed the gap between them and covered his lips with her mouth. Their tongues slipped over each other's and with such a kiss, it was easy for Deeks to fight off the slight disappointment he felt when she didn't immediately return his sentiments. She had always been a little more reserved, after all. And for as long as they'd already been intimate, their actual relationship was still very new.

Breaking for air, she breathed deeply. Boring into his soul through his eyes, Kensi told him, "We've both fought it for so long. But as long as I've been denying it, I can finally say it now: I love you, Marty Deeks. More than I ever thought I could."

Deeks felt as if his heart was going to leap out through his throat. He couldn't even smile he was so filled with joy. Given a few more seconds, he might have been able to muster a grin, but their lips were soon coupled again. Their bodies pressed together tightly and they moaned in unison, breathing each other's air as their tongues danced and dueled in delight.

He kept one arm wrapped tightly around her back, and tucked the other beneath her knees. With little effort, he lifted her entirely and stood up from the couch. Finally free to smile endlessly, he carried her to the bed and set her down.

With his hands behind her back, Deeks was able to unclasp Kensi's bra as he settled over her. The lacy straps hung loosely at her shoulders, and she helped to shed the garment completely when Deeks tugged at it with his teeth. Not caring to see where it landed when he tossed it aside, he peppered quick kisses to the soft skin on the outer curves of her breasts. His lips touched her for less than a fraction of a second each time, and she moaned impatiently while trying to hold his face to her chest.

"So you're going to tease me all night?" she asked him in a low voice.

"Just trying to make this as special as it feels," he explained, pressing a soft kiss above her heart.

"It already is," she assured him. "You don't need to do anything more."

He finally relented, tracing circles with his tongue around her pink nipples and putting his mouth on as much of her as he could. Her skin was still soft from the fancy bath lotion they had used last night, and a little savory from the day's exertion. He was addicted to the taste of her and never once lifted his mouth from her smooth skin. While his lips were busy with her breasts, his hands slipped down to toy with the lace at her waistline.

Kensi's hands were similarly occupied, and she grazed them on his mostly bare butt before finally locating the thin fabric holding him in place. He couldn't tell if she had done so intentionally, but when she tugged at his underwear, it actually wedged a little further between his cheeks. He winced, groaned and released her breast from his mouth to growl playfully and punish her by nibbling at her ear lobe.

She grinned at him and pushed on his shoulders until he had rolled over and was sitting up against the headboard. Kensi cupped his bulge with one of her hands through the fabric of his mankini. He could feel himself strain against her touch beneath the cloth while she inspected his choice of undergarment that would be embarrassing for a lesser man, or at least a less confident one. The pattern on the fabric did nothing to hide the distinct outline of each part of his manhood, and left nothing to the imagination.

Deeks' breath grew more ragged as she traced around the edge of his head, along his protruding shaft, and fondled the bottoms of his balls through the silky cloth before tugging at the waistband. He lifted his butt off the bed to help her rid himself of the restraints of his only piece of clothing. Finally unconfined, he sprung free. Kensi wiggled into a more comfortable position draped across his lap, keeping her rear within his reach and letting her breasts rest on his lower thighs.

He squeezed the hand on her butt and let out a satisfied moan when she wrapped her lips around his cock. As hard as he already was, she didn't need to coax him at all. Pumping his shaft with one hand she was free to suck on him vigorously. Deeks could do very little to contain the whimpers that escaped between his irregular breaths. Occasionally she would pause to run her tongue up his length or swirl it sloppily around his tip. She was so skilled at working her hand in tandem with her mouth that it was all he could do to hold off and attempt to make this last as long as he could.

He let his fingers slip between her legs from behind where he could just barely reach and tickle the moist lips of her pussy. She groaned deeply at his touch, and the vibrations from her voice traveled through her tongue to his dick and practically made his eyes roll back into his head. Her movements had grown more frantic since he started stroking her heat with the tips of his fingers.

"God, Kens! I'm so close!" he warned her, feeling his balls tighten and clenching his muscles to try and hold off for just a few more seconds of attention from her amazing mouth

With a gravely cry, he felt the intense surge of pleasure crash over his entire body and came into her mouth. She tugged on him a few more times and did her best to swallow what she could, wiping the rest off of her lips and onto his thighs.

"You almost never let me finish doing that for you," she told him, smiling while she continued to gently stroke his extra sensitive head.

"I'm just that confident I'll be ready to go again soon," he said cockily through his short breaths. "And tonight we have all the time in the world."

Following a moment of rest, Deeks sat up on his knees and lay Kensi on her back at the foot of the bed to pull the lacy thong down her long legs. After he tossed them aside, Kensi opened her legs for him, and he settled down on the bed between them. He slowly kissed his way up her thigh, enjoying how each of her muscles tensed in anticipation as he crept closer and closer to where he knew she ached for him.

As he took his time, Kensi reached down impatiently to continue what Deeks had started earlier. She massaged her growing wetness with two of her fingers and spread herself for him. When he caught the scent of her and saw her engorged bundle of nerves peaking out from between her folds, he was no longer able to keep the waiting game going.

He brought his lips to her center and kissed her clit languidly. She moaned from the foot of the bed and his eyes searched for hers in the flicker of the candle light. When she met his gaze he tried to show her with his look of heated adoration that he promised to repay her for what she had just done to him.

"God, Deeks! You're so good at that!" she told him wantonly as his tongue delved between her folds.

"Makes you glad we've had dozens of times to perfect this before, huh?" he asked her, intercepting her wandering hand with his and squeezing tightly. "And kinda makes you wish we'd given in sooner."

"I've thought that before, but—" she gasped, her thought cut short when he lightly grazed his teeth against her pink, flushed inner skin. Regaining her ability to speak when he lifted his head to listen to her, she continued, "But I really can't regret the way things happened if they got us to where we are now."

Deeks abandoned her pussy momentarily to crawl up her body and capture her lips in a demanding kiss. She had leaned up to meet him and he wrapped his arms around her back, pulling her chest against his.

Breaking from his hungry lips, she looked him in the eyes. Frowning slightly in confusion and shaking her head, she curved her lips in a sweet smile when she told him, "God, I love you Deeks. So much!"

His heart sang again. He already knew he would never tire of hearing those perfect words. He stole another kiss before assuring her quietly, "I love you too, Kens."

Deeks was hard and ready to go again, but he ignored his restless dick. Serious about his intention to make her come with his tongue first, he slithered back down her body, readdressing her breasts and belly as he went.

Returning to his target, he dove in with no more build up. He tucked the tips of two fingers into her heat while his tongue worked over her sensitive nub. He wondered if she could tell that he was tracing the outline of a heart over and over again. The way she was squirming on the bed below him, he was pretty sure she didn't have the ability to think much about anything.

He pushed his fingers a little further into her and felt her body tense. As deep as they could go, he curled them up and started to pump them in and out of her. Lapping at her clit, he could feel it start to pulsate. Kensi squeezed his head between her thighs and he could no longer move away even if he had wanted to. Thrusting her hips against his face and his fingers, she came with a series of breathy moans. Deeks groaned against her twitching flesh and caused her to writhe further at his touch.

She released his head from the vice of her legs and he pulled his fingers from her, drawing out a trail of her sweet juices down her inner thigh. He sat up on his knees again and met her intense gaze. He brought his sopping fingers first to his lips, where he licked them clean. Then to the head of his throbbing cock, where he rubbed the moisture around the tip.

He sat on his butt reclining against the mountain of pillows and reached out to her. She took the hands he offered and sat on his lap, straddling his thighs. His cock twitched impatiently against her legs and she stilled it with her hand.

Kensi leaned against him and guided his erection to the wet and ready opening of her pussy. He kept his eyes on hers until she sank down on him. He groaned and blinked slowly, and when he opened his eyes again, it was just in time to see her face approaching his. He opened his lips expectantly and her tongue darted into his mouth, gliding over his and scraping against his teeth.

In a rare show of self-restraint, Kensi rocked slowly on top of him. He didn't move in and out of her so much as she moved him back and forth. But the slow burn kindled by their movements was working for him. This lazy pace let him feel every detail of her inner walls, let him sink entirely in to the hilt with each thrust, let him appreciate the way her ass pressed against his balls and how she clenched around him every time his shaft rubbed against her clit.

She tangled her fingers in his hair and tilted her head back so he could dot kisses down her neck. Even with how calmly they were moving, he could detect her racing pulse through his lips. He leaned up and shifted her back so he could reach one of the breasts rocking in front of his face. And after a moment of sucking the aroused flesh into his mouth, he reclined her further and adjusted until he was laying on top of her.

Despite being free to increase their tempo, he kept his thrusts long, controlled, and torturously slow. From this position he was free to draw out almost entirely, letting his tip rub at the sensitive folds guarding her entrance, before plunging back in again.

Even though all her weight was on her back, Kensi's legs began to quiver on either side of him. Trying to repeat something he had learned from her accidentally once before, he pulled out entirely, and thrust back in, holding still deep within her. She moaned loudly and he pulled out again, rubbing the head of his cock against her clit, then wiggling it as he slid back in. The second time, she began to clench around him. Still pushing slowly, though with great effort, he moved within her a few more times until her gentle flutterings turned into violent pulsations.

She cried out his name and dug her nails into his shoulders, but Deeks kept moving. When he was certain she had calmed, he stilled entirely to try and build up the endurance he thought he needed to make her come one more time. Seizing an opportunity, Kensi pulled his face to hers for a hungry kiss. She bit at his lower lip with his and it ticked some primal instinct of his to start up again.

When he resumed it was with greater urgency. His desire to be sweet and extra loving was replaced with a desire to find a release; one he had been suppressing for many minutes now. The new pace he set was frantic. He slammed into her with such force and speed that he would have been concerned for her, if she weren't responding so enthusiastically.

Kensi had zero composure as she cried out with each of her sharp breaths. The otherwise peaceful cabin was filled with the sounds of their moans and groans, the clapping of their flesh as it met in a steady beat, the slight creak as they rocked the bed beneath them, and the hiss and crackle of the fire that had started to burn down.

Deeks had to hold himself up to maintain this tempo and could no longer reach her lips to kiss her— not that his breathing was steady enough to do so. He tried to look into her eyes, but hers were slammed shut, her face contorted in ecstasy.

Shifting his weight to one arm, he brought the other between them to rub her clit. One of her hands joined his to add extra pressure, and after a few seconds her moans were silenced. All she could do was gasp for air when her third climax hit. She arched her hips into him and forced the back of her head into the mattress below her.

When she was finally able to use her voice again, it was harsh with exhaustion. Encouraging him, she moaned, "Fuck, Deeks! Come on!"

Deeks did not need to be told again. The pulsations of her inner muscles were squeezing him so tightly that he was finding it difficult to move. Pushing in as deep as he could go he succumbed to the sensations. He groaned and his whole body shook as he emptied himself within her.

And then, quite abruptly, it was quiet.

It was several seconds before he relaxed his tensed muscles and let his body rest on top of hers. It was several _minutes_ before either had gained control of their breathing enough to speak. But in the mean time, their lips met in the softest, slowest, sweetest kisses of the night.

"I love you," he told her sincerely. His head pressed against hers, and his sweaty, golden locks mingled with her dark flowing hair.

"And I love you," she said, scraping her fingers through the scruff on his jaw as she cupped his face.

It was a tender moment, and as usual, Deeks just couldn't let it last. Grinning in amusement at the thought that just occurred to him, he told her, "Okay, but if we ever have kids— don't freak out—" he added quickly at her abruptly raised eyebrows. "And they, or anyone else asks us about the first time we said 'I love you,' we should tell them it was earlier on the mountain today from the top of the panorama lookout, right before a wicked run down the Dragon's Back double black diamond."

Kensi chuckled at him, shaking her head. But she agreed, "Works for me."

They separated and Deeks climbed out of bed to pull back the covers. Kensi surprised him somewhat when she got up too, and walked to the kitchenette. She grabbed the partially finished bottle of champagne and the brightly colored blanket from the couch. Deeks grabbed the glasses and joined her. Cuddled naked together in front of the fire, and wrapped in the same blanket, they finished their champagne in contended silence. After a few more minutes it was, of course, Deeks who spoke first.

"Hey Kens?" he asked softly.

"Yeah?"

"I wanted you to know that even though I was so…" he paused as he searched for the right words. "…uncertain these past few months. About what was best for us. About how we could ever make this work. I always knew one thing."

"What was that?" she asked him quietly, meeting his gentle gaze.

"That I loved you," he answered simply. "And I would be willing to give away everything I've worked for— everything I have, for the chance to be with you."

Sensing an occasion to kiss him again, she told him, "Well, it looks like your gamble paid off. For both of us."

* * *

 **A/N: Huge thanks to all of you readers who made it all the way through this fic. Especially to those who followed, favorited, and took the time to review. I hope you've enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.**

 **If you're jonesin' for just one more chapter, one of my already posted one-shot fics, "Study Session," could serve as an epilogue to this.**

 **If this sort-of-story is your thing, consider following me or checking out my other work. I have a few more one-shots in progress, the possibility of another multi-chapter arc set in season 5 being outlined, and dozens of other ideas banging around (see what I did there?) in my head.**

 **Moose out.**


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